NYgirl

I Am OK

2005-09-30T10:38:00.000-07:00

Thank you so much for the emails & comments. I apologize for not being able to blog & respond to emails these days. I was in a car accident & things have been a bit tough. But, things are getting easier & I hope to be back next week :)

God must have heard you guys. Thanks again.

Never Say Never

2005-09-19T19:53:00.000-07:00

What a way to learn that lesson.

I'm cheering for Hillary in this one.

Tomorrow's headline prediction: Hell Freezes Over

Ten gallon hat tip: Mwalimu Daudi

Got Crime? Legalize It- No More Crime

2005-09-19T16:25:00.000-07:00

That seems to be the way that Sri Lankan officials were thinking when they did this:

The Sri Lankan Cabinet has decided to reduce the age of consent for sexual encounters from 16 to 13 years.

Cabinet spokesperson Minister Nimal Siripala de Silva said the action has been taken due to rising numbers of men arrested for sexual relations with girls below the age of 16.

The Minister said this proposal was made to the Cabinet by Justice Minister W.D.J. Seneviratne and was approved this week after much debate and a long review.

With the new amendment to the law, in a rape case, the matter of consent would arise only when the individual is below the age of 13. The Amendment Bill will be presented in Parliament shortly.

Thirteen: a year more than what SCOTUS Justice Ginsburg considers to an acceptable age of consent.

Hat tip: Love America First

The Minute Men & Their Opponents

2005-09-19T15:25:00.000-07:00

German Election & Its Implications For America

2005-09-18T09:35:00.000-07:00

The exit polls:
Germany's ARD television puts the Christian Democrats in the lead with 35.5% of the vote, ahead of the Social Democrats on 34%.

There is a chance that the Schroeder era will soon be over. What this means for us in the US: a better ally in the war against terror & (knock on wood) the dawn of an economically healthier Europe. While the margin is less than ideal & will lead to quite a bit of gridlock, as it has in America, a victory can mean the begining of a new way of doing things.

The German economy is doing very badly & the astronomical unemployment rate, 11.6% is not very helpful either. Thus, the German public is having second thoughts about their love affair with socialism.

The head of the conservative coalition Angela Merkel, grew up in the former East Germany & harbors no delusions of Communist utopias. She is also in favor of giving precedence to relationships with the emerging Eastern & Central European states & America over that with France. The wide spread rejection of the EU, on which France was heavily invested, is clearly having an impact.

Schroeder's party, the Socialist Democrats, tried to play the anti-Americanism card in a last ditched effort to save themselves. A poster featuring the coffins of American soldier which would have made Code Pink proud was a part of their campaign.

Interestingly, there have been two other major elections, which have yielded this same type of result:

In Japan, Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi & his party won by a landslide during the special election which he called for when challenged in his efforts to privatize the state owned postal system (the Japanese post office functions as a bank & insurance agency too, it's assets are in the billions). This victory too was fortuitous for the current administration & America in general, as LDP, particularly Koizumi's faction, is hawkish & good allies in the war against terror as well as handling China & North Korea.

In May of 2002, in Dutch conservatives won control of the government despite the murder of the party leader Pim Fortuyn. The major impetus for their victory was the stagnant Dutch economy, which had been hobbled by socialistic policies, as well strong immigration reform policies.

In the US, we have yet to have any party or major candidate adopt such a strong stance on the issue. Hopefully this will change.

A major reason for all three of these conservative victories have been the desire to cut down government expenditure: a lesson American conservatives would do well to keep in mind.

Progress

2005-09-18T09:21:00.000-07:00

North Korea introduces first 'credit card'.

Next thing ya' know, the dear leader will invent the North Korean internet.

Somebody Please Call A Doctor

2005-09-18T09:14:00.000-07:00

Because Cindy has really, really gone off the deep end this time.

...George Bush needs to stop talking, admit the mistakes of his all around failed administration, pull our troops out of occupied New Orleans and Iraq, and excuse his self from power...

She clearly needs a bed at a psychiatric facility. Oh wait, we might need a another bed too.

Hat tip: Alarming News

New Yorkers Do It Again!

2005-09-14T16:11:00.000-07:00

From USA Today:
Attacks on and around the 7-mile highway linking Baghdad to its international airport have dropped 41% since May, the result of increased U.S. and Iraqi troop presence and new tactics to battle insurgents along one of the world's most dangerous roads.

There hasn't been a suicide car bombing on the road since April, according to U.S. military statistics through August...

As this is the airport road & the design of the highway as well as the surrounding area makes it very difficult to secure, this was once one of the most dangerous places in Baghdad. The fact that it was frequently used by diplomats & other high profile individuals made it especially tempting for terrorists.

Guess to whom much of the responsibility for this road & neighborhood falls to? The New York National Guard's 1st Battalion, 69th Infantry Regiment!
Of course, they gave the New Yorkers the toughest job: we're the best (bombastic regionalism over)

However, I do think that this adds further proof to the already accepted fact that New York is a very special place, wouldn't you agree :-)

From The Horse's Mouth

2005-09-14T14:30:00.000-07:00

Six Meat Buffet has posted a good portion of a 2003 NYT editorial in which Eason Jordan admits that CNN did not tell all they knew about Saddam.

The ACLU Tries to Endanger Honest People: Again

2005-09-14T11:08:00.000-07:00

While a majority of evacuees are good people, obviously, there will be among them those of criminal background. Some may even be wanted. Therefore, most sane people would agree that it makes sense to do background checks on them, before allowing them to move into their new shelters.

Even one of the evacuees interviewed agrees:
“I would, I would want to know who may be my neighbor,” Seymour said. “You're imposing but also you need to know.”

These checks do involve some inconvenience, but is it as bad as having a child subject to sex abuse? For about 99% of us, including evacuee Cherlynn Seymour, the answer is no.

However, for the ACLU, the answer is very different. They are complaining that:
...the move is unconstitutional and unjust. The spokesperson added that it is the equivalent to state border guards and that Pennsylvania state officials are preying on people who are already down and out on their luck...

I am sure NAMBLA would heartily concur.

They have yet to take legal action. Let's hope they decide to exercise a some judgment at least now. The Constitution is not a suicide pact. Its purpose is to make our lives better: not worse.

In fact, as Urban League Public Housing site coordinator Gerri Reynolds points out:
“Public housing authorities requires it of all residents and we're not just singling them out or picking on them,” Reynolds said. “It's required of all residents applying for public housing.”

As seven convicted sex offenders arrived with more than 200 other evacuees at Cape Cod, these concerns are clearly well placed.

However, despite the sex offenders being housed on a separate floor of a dormitory with only single men, their floor does not have any extra security because:the state doesn’t want to isolate them.

Hat tip: NIF, Stop the ACLU

Kitty Power

2005-09-14T07:20:00.000-07:00

I can see why the Terriorists are fully behind this one :) As for me, while I'm all for alternative energy sources, this might be going just a bit too far.

Update: I have corrected the link. My apologies.
Update II: The pee powered battery. Perhaps there is hope for the kitty cats if they drink enough water :)

Life Imitates Scrappleface

2005-09-13T16:02:00.000-07:00

What a day.

ScrappleFace's Sen. Kennedy's Questions for Judge Roberts:
...1. Judge Roberts, when the Federal Emergency Management Agency unleashed a new form of terror on the Gulf Coast forcing President Bush to reluctantly cut short his month-long vacation, the question in the minds of most mainstream Americans was 'Why do Republicans hate black people so much?' So my question for you is, when you become Chief Justice of the United States, will Clarence Thomas still have access to the same men's restroom as the rest of his male colleagues?...

WashTimes:
It took less than an hour before Senators considering federal Judge John G. Roberts Jr.'s nomination to the Supreme Court fell into disagreement over Hurricane Katrina....

...Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, the Massachusetts Democrat, said lessons should be learned from the hurricane. "The powerful winds and flood waters of Katrina tore away the mask that has hidden from public view the many Americans who are left out and left behind," he said. "As one nation under God, we cannot continue to ignore the injustice, the inequality and the gross disparities that exist in our society."...

update: More musings on Teddo

Wuzzadem Waz Right?

2005-09-13T15:18:00.000-07:00

Life imitates Wuzzadem

Via Drudge:
After weeks of intense Katrina coverage from the main press, LA TIMES guru Michael Kinsley divulges that CNN was coaching guests to artificially enhance emotions!
Kinsley writes:
"The TV news networks, which only a few months ago were piously suppressing emotional fireworks by their pundits, are now piously encouraging their news anchors to break out of the emotional straitjackets and express outrage. A Los Angeles Times colleague of mine, appearing on CNN last week to talk about Katrina, was told by a producer to 'get angry'."

This may come as a surprise, but I am no fan of the MSM, but even I wasn't expecting them to sink this low.

Katrina: An Environmentalist Disaster?

2005-09-12T16:34:00.000-07:00

They prevented us from having the option of buying our oil from Australia. Could they have prevented the building of a hurricane barrier to protect NO ?

Hat Tip: Michelle Malkin

No Good Deed Ever Goes Unpunished

2005-09-12T11:00:00.000-07:00

1. Following the overcrowding at the Superdome, the city of Huston, TX generously offered to take in a large number of evacuees. These people were cared for with the money & resources of the good people of the state of Texas.

And how does the NYT repay their generosity? By writing an article entitled Houston Finds Business Boon After Katrina. The opening paragraph:

Perhaps no city in the United States is in a better spot than Houston to turn Katrina's tragedy into opportunity. And businesses here are already scrambling to profit in the hurricane's aftermath.

The article however does not mention the amounts spent on the evacuees by the taxpayers of Texas. Nor does it mention that the local public schools might have trouble accommodating the sudden influx of new students. Nor does it mention the possible affects of a surplus of labor on the local economy. The writer merely goes on & on about how business have benefited from the re-settlement. So much for reporting both sides of the story.

2. On September 6th, American hostage Roy Hallums was rescued by the American & Iraqi military thanks to a tip they got from a detainee.

How did the NYT report this? They included it in the middle of a story on a terrorist bombing. The title of the story was, Basra Bombs Kill 16 Iraqis and 4 U.S. Contractors. Nine paragraphs into the article they mention, '& oh by the way':
There was also a piece of good news: American military officials said they had rescued an American contractor who was kidnapped last Nov. 1. American soldiers found the hostage, Roy Hallums, at an isolated farmhouse 15 miles south of Baghdad after receiving a tip from an Iraqi detainee, military officials said in a statement. He was in good condition and was receiving medical care, the officials said. An Iraqi captive with him whose name was not released was also freed.

They then proceeded to devote a mere three paragraphs, including the one I cited, to this news.

The AP's reporting was not much better. They, to their credit did the story with the title, American Hostage Freed After 10 Months. However, while the opening paragraph was:
The U.S. military, acting on a tip, raided an isolated farmhouse outside the capital Wednesday and rescued an American businessman held hostage for 10 months. The kidnappers, who had kept their captive bound and gagged, escaped without a gunbattle.

The very next paragraph discusses the bombing in Basra & more than half the story is devoted to other news such as the bombing & Saddam's trial.

Why did such good news get buried? The military did a great job: where was the recognition?

3. On September 5th, Iraqi soldiers donated to the victims of Katrina.

TAJI, Iraq, Sept. 9, 2005 — Iraqi soldiers serving at Taji military base collected 1,000,000 Iraqi dinars for victims of Hurricane Katrina.
Iraqi Col. Abbas Fadhil, Iraqi base commander, presented the money to U.S. Col. Paul D. Linkenhoker, Taji Coalition base commander, at a Sept. 5 staff meeting.
“We are all brothers,” said Abbas. “When one suffers tragedy, we all suffer their pain.”
The amount of money is small in American dollars - roughly $680 - but it represents a huge act of compassion from Iraqi soldiers to their American counterparts, said U.S. Army Maj. Michael Goyne.
“I was overwhelmed by the amount of their generosity,” Goyne said. “I was proud and happy to know Col. Abbas, his officers, NCOs and fellow soldiers. That amount represents a month’s salary for most of those soldiers.”
Abbas read a letter he wrote after giving the envelope to Linkenhoker.
"I am Colonel Abbas Fadhil; Tadji Military Base Commander,” Abbas wrote. “On behalf of myself and all the People of Tadji Military Base; I would like to console the American People and Government for getting this horrible disaster. So we would like to donate 1.000.000 Iraqi Dinars to help the government and the People also I would like to console all the ASTs who helped us rebuilding our country and our Army. We appreciate the American's help and support. Thank you."

Did you see the NYT story on this?

Hat tip: lfg, Mudville

Never Forget 9.11.01

2005-09-11T10:52:00.000-07:00

Please note: as I would like this to remain the top post of the day, today's other posts will be posted below this.

Pentagon photo via Henry

9.11.2005

2005-09-11T09:54:00.000-07:00

It seems like yesterday that the Manhattan skyline was forever altered. Just as those who of an earlier generation remember exactly where they were when they heard of the assassination of JFK, my generation will remember where we were when we heard about 9/11. In terms of its implications, Pearl Harbor is perhaps a better analogy. For some of us, it was a day that forced us to re-examine our views, pay closer attention to the happenings of the world around us, & the things we were taught. Other appear to need a little more time.

Four years ago people jumped out of the shattered windows of a skyscraper to take a chance at life rather than submit to the certainty of death among flames. They were ordinary people, civilians, who saw the dawn on September 11th 2001 as nothing more than another day. They were good hard working people who went to work early to get a head start on the day. Little did they know what a hateful Islamist named Osama bin Laden & his compatriots wished to do. But for the grace of Gad, it could have been any of us here today. We must not forget.

While much has been done to address the threat of Islamic terrorism, much still remains to be done.

This is especially so regarding the precarious situation of our border with Mexico, which remains an undefended gateway into our country. Terrorists have taken note of this & used in several occasions. The ease of entry is so well known that Al Jazeera even tried to make a documentary on it. A recent study by the Center for Immigration Studies showed how terrorists routinely flouted immigration laws:
Overall, 59 of 94 foreign-born nationals who were either convicted or indicted on terror charges broke federal immigration laws to enter or remain in the country between 1993 and 2004, the report found. It also noted:
_Twenty-two of the 94 either had student visas or other applications approving them to study in the United States; another 17 used visitor visas to enter the country.
_In at least 13 instances, suspected and convicted terrorists overstayed their temporary visas.
_Seven of the 94 were indicted for using false driver's licenses, birth certificates, Social Security cards and immigration records.
_Twenty-one became naturalized citizens.
The report identified many of the immigrants as affiliated with at least one terror organization, including 40 with al-Qaida, 16 with Hamas, 16 with the Palestinian or Egyptian Islamic Jihad, and six with Hezbollah.
And these are merely the ones who were apprehended, I dread to think of the numbers of those who remain among us.

Sadly, there are some, even in this country, who wish to undermine the war against terrorism & any efforts to preserve the memory of 9/11. Attempts are already being made by the multiculti, PC left to desecrate the memory of 9/11. The WTC memorial & International Freedom Center still remain prey to those whose visions of the future are congruent to that of the Islamicists.

The memorial for the passengers of Flight 93 is also in danger. The design of the Flight 93 National Memorial is in the shape of a crescent & features a "tower of voices": both clearly symbols of Islam. The excuse, which is what it is, that Paul Murdoch did not see a connection to Islam in the design, is rather difficult for many of us to buy:
Architects—good ones like Paul Murdoch and his design crew—are fully aware of the symbolism that they put into their work. The first order of business is to make money, of course, which is why their design incorporates various half-religious notions of sacredness and healing, which appeal to people’s sentimentalism. But no one can tell me that it never crossed their minds that the Crescent is the symbol of Islam, just as the Cross is the symbol of Christianity. (Neither started out that way: the Crescent was originally a pagan symbol, and the Cross was a favorite torture device of the Romans.)

As one observer noted, plastering a Crescent across the landscape in tribute to the heroes of Flight 93—to be seen clearly from the air—is like building a memorial to the Holocaust victims in the form of a Swastika. Or imagine the furor had we built the Pearl Harbor Memorial in a pattern that reminded us of the Japanese war flag, with planes and ships extending, beam-like, from a central orb.

The presence of “minaret” in the Memorial design is barely apparent, but only because, living in a non-Islamic nation, we have no need to take note of its function: it is used by the muezzin (crier) to call the faithful to turn toward Mecca and pray. The minaret, five times a day, literally becomes a “tower of voices.” Is connecting the Flight 93 Memorial tower to an Islamic minaret a stretch? Not with the Crescent symbol in proximity.

Is there any better way to insult the heroism of the brave passengers of flight 93 who refused to submit to the will of Islamists?

The MSM has contributed more than their fair share towards the attacking the war on terror. They cannot show Abu Graib enough, but refuse to show the victims of Saddam's torture or the victims of Islamist punishment with the same frequency. The juxtaposition of CNN's insistence that they be allowed to film the recovery of the dead at NO, while refusing to show the most disturbing images of 9/11 does make their contention of unbiased reporting highly questionable. But, of course these are the same people who jump at the chance to reel off casualty lists with no mention of their mission & what they accomplished not any mention of the good done by American troops, not to mention Sheehaning.

Al Jazeera, refused to show the tape of the heroism of Fabrizio Quattrocchi, who fought the terrorists who made him dig his own grave, but had little hesitation reporting the beheadings of Danny Pearl & other hostages who were unable to resist their captors. While, Al Jazeera's behavior is to be expected, at least after 9/11 one would think that the American MSM would change their ways. It is sad that they show very little inclination to do so.

Despite the strides made in Afghanistan, Iraq & Lebannon, as its supporters are unceasing in their efforts to destroy democracy & freedom, the threat of terrorism remains. Freedom isn't free: it must be fought for. It is important that we not remain silent & resist the efforts of those who ally themselves with the groups responsible for 9/11/2001 in order to prevent future 9/11's.

Hat Tip: La Shawn, My Pet Jawa, OTB
Update: A graphic of the red crescent.
Paul Murdock's philosophy.

Here They Go Again

2005-09-10T15:29:00.000-07:00

Now that Cindy Sheehan's fifteen minutes of fame are nearing the end, the MSM is looking far & wide for her replacement. Seek & ye shall find, & it looks like they found just what they were looking for in Adele Welty.The NY Newsday has done a feature dedicated solely to her. Just as the MSM did not offer the same amount of coverage to the parents who lost a child in the Iraq War & are supportive of the effort, no mention is ever made of any family members of those lost in 9/11 who are supportive of the war on terror.

I, as everyone else, feel sympathy towards her for her loss, but she is not the only one who suffered a loss on that terrible day. Why did NY Newsday not consider others who suffered a loss & feel differently unworthy of a feature story?

Mrs. Welty has the right to protest all she wants, but one would think that the press might consider it their duty to report the news in an unbiased manner.

The Sheehaning of 9/11 is reprehensible.

Hat Tip:My Pet Jawa, The Man

Sorry :(

2005-09-09T17:02:00.000-07:00

I am so busy & completely exhausted today, so I don't think I'll have the time to blog, again. But, I promise to post tomorrow.

A poem by A. M Siriano, which is, alas, applicable to non-poetic endeavors too :(

Poet's Resolution

I shall not use "Alas!" in poems,
Which makes me sound inane.
Nor shall I force the rhyme of words—
Alas! I've slipped again.
© 2003 A. M. Siriano

Celebrities Unscripted

2005-09-07T15:08:00.000-07:00

First there was Kayne West, then there was Sean Penn & Operation Red Cup, now Celine Dion gets touchy-feely.

Thank God for the celebs. We need comedy now more than ever.

CNN rush transcript.

KING: Joining us now is an old and dear friend, Celine Dion, the musical superstar. She's in her dressing room at Caesar's Palace in Las Vegas. She will go on stage in about a half hour. She and the director of her wonderful show, a show I've seen, Franco Dragone, have donated by the way, pledged $1 million to the American Red Cross.What has been your response, Celine, to this? I especially ask this because you're French Canadian from Montreal and New Orleans is a mostly French city.

CELINE DION, SINGER: Correct and I've been there a few times. We've stayed there. I've, you know, filmed videos there and so Rene and I, we've been to New Orleans. And, I have to say, Larry, that and state it as the rest of the world if I may I was watching you behind, there's a television right now, I'm watching and I'm especially waiting like the rest of the world.

I'm waking up in the morning. I'm having a coffee. I barely can swallow it. I come here at Caesar's Palace every night to perform. I barely can sing. But for respect the people who come I am still singing. When I come home at night, my son is waiting for me. I watch television.

Yes, we gave $1 million but what we expect, what I want to look like the rest of the world, I open the television there's people still there waiting to be rescued and for me it's not acceptable. I know there's reasons for it. I'm sorry to say I'm being rude but I don't want to hear those reasons.

You know, some people are stealing and they're making a big deal out of it. Oh, they're stealing 20 pair of jeans or they're stealing television sets. Who cares? They're not going to go too far with it. Maybe those people are so poor, some of the people who do that they're so poor they've never touched anything in their lives. Let them touch those things for once.

(So that means you wouldn't mind if I break into your house & "touch" your designer clothes & shoes. I can't afford the Manolos & Jimmy Choos I love & adore - Thanks Celine :)

The main thing right now it's not the people who are stealing. It's the people who are left there and they're watching helicopters flying over their heads and they're praying. How come it's so easy to send planes in another country to kill everyone in a second, to destroy lives?

We need to serve our country and for me to serve our country is to be there right now to rescue the rest of the people. We need the cash. We need the blood. We need the support. Right now we need the prayers.

You know when I was hearing a couple of days ago that these things are not reachable it's too full of water, maybe I'm too much like my -- I'm not thinking with my head. (You've never uttered a truer sentence, hon) I'm talking with my heart. Nobody can open any roofs? The helicopters flying in take two people at a time, take a kayak. Go into those walls.

There's kids being raped at night. They hear gunshots, big guns, what's that? Those people are praying. They're walking. They're like this, hello, do you see us? We're still alive but we're dying. It's terrible.

KING: Celine.

DION: I do not want to talk to you about money.

KING: How do you explain it to your young son?

DION: Well, I have to (INADUIBLE).

KING: Are you OK?

DION: Yes, Rene Charles knows because sometimes he watches televisions with me and I'm saying to him those people went through a big storm and they will be fine because I know at the end they'll be fine and I hope and we're all praying for them. I'm trying not to put to Rene Charles something so dramatic and that's why I'm sorry for crying so hard because I'm holding it for the last week and I'm trying to tell my son that everything is going to be OK. But I see those mothers over there, they're like (INAUDIBLE).

KING: But look at this thins way, Celine, though a lot of people, we've been doing the show now for two and a half hours. We've been asking a lot of people how they can help, how you can help? A lot of people all over the world want to help. You gave $1 million. You're going to help a lot of people live and survive. You should take great pride in that, one, that you've attained the ability to be able to do that, to be able to give $1 million. You should take pride in that.

DION: I understand it. I understand it's very important because eventually they will need that money but it's just very frustrating that Franco and (INAUDIBLE) and me oh $1 million. This is one thing. In three months, in six months they will need that money. Right now they're praying for water so we need to send them the water. They don't care about my check. So, it's just frustrating because in our part of the world we're trying our best and we're expecting those people -- I'm sorry.

(If you're so upset, why don't you give more than $1 million? In the 2003-2004 fiscal year, you were worth $320 million. I doubt you're fortunes are a lot less this year. $1 million is less then 10% of your net worth. )

KING: Your check will turn into something. I know you got to go on soon but we couldn't spend any time with you without asking you, do you have any kind of thing you would like to sing that fits this moment? Is there any song?

DION: Oh, my gosh.

KING: Even if you did a little of it. I don't want to...

DION: Well, the only song that comes to my mind right now is definitely a prayer. I did sing that song a few weeks -- a few years back with Andrea Bocelli.

KING: Ah, yes.

DION: And I cannot think -- I cannot think about a song but a prayer. I will do my very best and I'll do my best.

(CELINE SINGS "THE PRAYER")

DION: God bless them all.

KING: Thank you, Celine. Celine Dion, she'll go on stage in 20 minutes. There's a trooper.We'll be right back. Don't go away.

Hat Tip: Basil, Six Meat Buffet

Another View of the National Guard Deployment

2005-09-07T14:38:00.000-07:00

In yesterday's post, I expressed the opinion that the National Guard was deployed too late by the state & local officials. In response, the RTO Trainer, who is taking part in the rescue efforts, offered a differing view of the situation. As I found his comment extremely insightful, I would like to post it.
Here is his comment:

If I may play Devil's Advocate regarding the employment of the National Guard.The Louisiana Guard were deployed well before the storm hit.

The question wasn't of if they were there, but of what they were tasked with.

All indications I have right now indicate that thre was a great deal of confusiuon about what missions were what priority at what time.

The fist thing they did after the storm was to augment the first responders trying to locate and extract people from untennable postions. This however, left teh police, understaffed and shrinking, to handle the security situation alone which begna to spiral out of control. Then the Guard was retasked with security duties but apparently with a very restricted set of options. (Even if I knew details on that score, I could not discuss them.) That drew down the first-respoise capacity. Then a large portion fo the guard were retasked again, with logistical concerns.

It appears that it was not a matter of the Guard not being employed, but that prioritys and missions were not set and rehearsed in advance. The failure of the State and local authorites was not in failing to act (at least with respect to the Guard) but in appreciating the scope of the problems and the sequence of events.

In his blog, he posts The timeline that is NOT being reported. I urge you to read this for more insight into the situation in NO.

American Hostage Freed After 10 Months

2005-09-07T14:25:00.000-07:00

Great news.

The U.S. military, acting on a tip, raided an isolated farmhouse outside the capital Wednesday and rescued an American businessman held hostage for 10 months. The kidnappers, who had kept their captive bound and gagged, escaped without a gunbattle...

Roy Hallums, 57, was "in good condition and is receiving medical care," a military statement said after U.S. forces freed him and an unidentified Iraqi from the farmhouse 15 miles south of Baghdad.

Lt. Col. Steven A. Boylan, a military spokesman, said the tipster whose information led to Hallums' release was captured just a few hours before the operation....

Hallums, formerly of Newport Beach, Calif., was kidnapped at gunpoint from his office in the Mansour district of Baghdad on Nov. 1, 2004. At the time, he was working for the Saudi Arabian Trading and Construction Co., supplying food to the Iraqi army.

An Iraqi guard and one attacker were killed in the attack. The kidnappers also seized a Filipino, a Nepalese and three Iraqis, but later freed them...
(My Pet Jawa also covers this)

If you follow this link to the AP report I've cited, you'll see how this wonderful news, which IMHO deserved it's own story, is reported. Very sad.

A Tale of Two States

2005-09-06T13:27:00.000-07:00

Despite almost all of the Katrina coverage being focused on Louisiana, Katrina hit Mississippi far worse. Yet, Mississippi did not experience the same chaos & anarchy. As a Chrenkoff reader points out:
...Free tip - contrast the Louisiana situation with the one next door in Mississippi - Gov. Barbour (R-MS). What's been lost in all the blather over New Orleans is that it was really Mississippi that took the big hit. The buildings in New Orleans are still standing; the Gulf Coast of Mississippi basically has been scrubbed, like God took out a pencil eraser and just erased it....

I really don't like to find fault at times like this, but one thing that was missing was a quick recognition that in such a situation the potential for civil collapse is nearly 100%. Once the weather settles, you need to immediately declare marshal law and send in the MPs. That's basically what Haley Barbour did in Mississippi - there were a few early problems but very quickly the MPs were patrolling what was left of Biloxi and Gulfport and keeping a lid on things. Back on Tuesday when I put on the news and we all saw Kathleen Blanco bursting into tears, I knew that was the wrong message and would bring trouble. Louisiana and New Orleans basically have those touchy-feely, "I'm okay, you're okay" soft-leftie types in charge. Their education took a few days and has been expensive...

Amidst all the hyperventilating that's going on, it's actually a good time for a civics lesson, particularly watching the competence of the people in Mississippi and the gross incompetence of almost all concerned in Louisiana. Who was responsible for what?...

Indeed, did Louisiana have anyone responsible for anything at the local level? The infamous photos of the unused school buses & the failure of the governor to deploy the National Guard immediately & the failure of Nagin to order a mandatory evacuation are damning.

Despite the health issues caused by the disaster, a state-of-the-art mobile hospital developed by the Dept of Homeland Security to specifically to deal with disasters & causalities was:
...as of Sunday afternoon was parked on a gravel lot 70 miles north of New Orleans because Louisiana officials for several days would not let them deploy to the flooded city...

While some of the criticisms of FEMA director Michael D. Brown, such as his refusal of offers for help by Chicago Mayor Richard M. Daley, New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson and the American Ambulance Association, are justified, the fact that neither he nor Dept of Homeland Security Michael Chertoff were made aware of the full extent of the problem by state & local officials in a timely fashion is indicative of major problems at the local level.

In his essay, Robert Tracinski discusses the role of the welfare state in creating the immoral characters who shot at rescue helicopters & looted jewelry & electronic goods & possibly even engaged in rape & battery (though there is a possibility that these were merely exaggerations). As he argues:
If this is just a natural disaster, the response for public officials is obvious: you bring in food, water, and doctors; you send transportation to evacuate refugees to temporary shelters; you send engineers to stop the flooding and rebuild the city's infrastructure. For journalists, natural disasters also have a familiar pattern: the heroism of ordinary people pulling together to survive; the hard work and dedication of doctors, nurses, and rescue workers; the steps being taken to clean up and rebuild.

Public officials did not expect that the first thing they would have to do is to send thousands of armed troops in armored vehicle, as if they are suppressing an enemy insurgency. And journalists—myself included—did not expect that the story would not be about rain, wind, and flooding, but about rape, murder, and looting.

In the summer of 2003, NYC experienced a blackout. While the famous blackout of the seventies produced a Louisiana-style anarchy, the 2003 black out resulted in only three outage related deaths & four crimes-with arrests for all four. The only major incidents were fires as a result of candles. People slept outside escape the heat & stranded commuters, unable to get hotel rooms, slept on the streets with laptops & other expensive electronic items lying unguarded beside them. The atmosphere was not a Hobbsian one with the strong preying on the weak.

Detroit, Michigan was similarly calm & orderly. Interestingly, parts of Ottowa, Canada did experience serious civil disorder & a state of emergency had to be declared.

As Heather MacDonald points out, not only did the NYDA act swiftly & decisively, they also anticipated looting & took action to prevent thugs from terrorizing people:
When the first window shattered on Brooklyn’s Flatbush Avenue, less than five minutes after the lights went out, the department immediately erected barriers along the avenue and maintained a highly visible presence there for the rest of the night. It did the same in other areas hit by thievery during the 1977 blackout, as well as in neighborhoods marked by recent shootings—a sign of a criminally disposed population.

The cops started making arrests soon after the power stopped, and in large numbers—up to two-dozen hoodlums at a time. Getting these early-birds in custody stopped them from wreaking further havoc and sent a strong message to copycats that lawlessness would not be tolerated. Admittedly, some of the looters weren’t much of a challenge for the police. For example, 23 would-be sneaker thieves cut into the roof of a Brooklyn Foot Locker store and dropped to the floor below, intending to walk out the door with their booty. They hadn’t noticed the locked gate blocking their exit. The police picked them up like bugs trapped in a Roach Motel.

An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.

In NYC, the criminals were afraid of the police, not the other way around as in New Orleans. This was the result of the police force being large, well supported by the city administration & highly trained. The disaster training drills, which Mayor Guilani insisted upon even pre 9/11, were made even more frequent post 9/11, to the point where every borough commander, who was fully empowered to do what needed to be done, sprang into action efficiently.

Whatever happened to Louisiana's emergency plan?

In this age of mass media, the manner in which elected officials conduct themselves as well as the words they use go a long way in setting the tone. Contrast the calm & reassuring manner of Rudy Guilani & Mike Bloomberg to the hysterical ones of Ray Nagin, Kathleen Blanco, & Mary Landrieu. I do not recall Mayor Guilani ever threatening to punch anyone for critisism, fair or unfair. He countered criticisms with factual debate, rather than sink to the level of a common hoodlum.

Interestingly, just as 9/11 brought Mayor Guilani to the national spotlight & made him a potential presidential candidate in the minds of many, the wonderful handling of Katrina in Mississippi has prompted the same thoughts in the minds of some of Haley Barbour.

Let the record reflect Karol's prescience in the matter.

Hat Tip: lgf, Chrenkoff

A side note: I have a bit of a cold these days, so please excuse the spelling & grammatical errors. I hope I still make sence :) Please bear with me. Thanks.

Greenpeace, RFK Jr., Oil Independence & Alternative Energies

2005-09-05T12:08:00.000-07:00

The damage caused by Hurricane Katrina & the ensuing rise in gas prices has brought the issue of oil to the forefront again. Not only do we need to build more refineries, but we should also exert a greater effort into exploring alternative energy sources & oil independence No one can deny the need for this, particularly in light of the war on terrorism, a large part of which is funded by the Saudi Arabia.

The often-repeated answer for why we haven't developed alternative energy sources or freed our selves from the clutches of OPEC is: the big greedy oil companies obstruct the development of alternative energy sources & the government is not sufficiently supportive of efforts to develop them. And yet, very little attention has been given to the role of environmental groups & the NIMBYism of the rich & famous.

Isn't it amazing how despite our dependence on the Saudis for oil, the United States of America has oil deposits three times the size of Saudi Arabia's?

However, this oil is found in shale rocks, rather than the currently used liquid form. Extracting this oil requires that the rock be mined & heated to high temperatures in order to extract the oil. While there are many efforts being made to minimize the environmental impact, as with anything else, there are effects. Naturally, this has raised the ire of the environmental lobby.

When attempts were made to extract shale oil in Australia, Greenpeace vehemently opposed the efforts & succeeded in derailing the project by utilizing their massive lobbying power. The project was declared over in July of 2004, despite the fact that considering the exigencies caused by the war on terror & OPEC's grip on the price of oil, such an endeavor may have benefited Australians even if it were partly government funded.

Despite their opposition to government funding of the efforts to extract shale oil, in the conclusion of their report, Greenpeace says:
Rather than propping up polluting industries such as shale oil, governments should be helping develop clean, renewable energy and fuels such as solar and wind power, and hydrogen fuel cells.
All of which are wonderful, but will not be available for mass scale use for at least the next decade & possibly even longer. These efforts will also require millions in government funding for research.

Reading the horrible history of this movement, dedicated to destroying the possibility of ending our dependence on Middle Eastern oil, which persisted even after 9/11 & the Bali bombings which killed many Australians, can easily make any sane person apoplectic with rage.

Had it not been for Greenpeace, we might have had the option today of buying our oil from Australia, a true friend & ally.

However, considering the vast quantity found in our own deposits, it is likely that there would not have been the necessity to buy oil even from a friend, as we could easily have been completely energy independent.

In the United States, the effort to develop shale oil based gas has been hindered not only by environmental concerns, but also bureaucratic regulations. As much of the shale oil producing region is controlled by the Bureau of Land Management, production could not begin until the stipulations, found in the Minerals Leasing Act, which prevent the development of large scale commercial projects & leasing, were altered by the Energy bill of 2005.

The elimination of red tape means that the only major danger to shale oil production is the environmentalists. Were they to discover in the area some endangered animal or there be a few emissions, despite the use of newer methods, heaven forefend us from the wrath of the powerful environmental lobby. Let us hope that shale oil development in the United States does not suffer the same fate as that of Australia.

One of the worst natural disasters to hit the United States, not only destroyed a city & numerous lives, but also broke the restraints of logic in the minds of those like Robert F. Kennedy Jr. On 29th of August, he who wrote a piece in the HuffPo suggesting that the Republicans ‘caused’ ‘global warming’ & Katrina.

However, the MSM has been quick to forget the fact that this scion of the wealthy & powerful Kennedy dynasty opposed the effort to erect wind turbines along Martha's Vineyard, Cape Cod & Nantucket. Other members of the Kennedy dynasty, including his uncle, Senator Ted Kennedy, as well as many other celebrities, joined him in this crusade.

As the residents of the area are reputed as being environmentally conscious, the opposition shocked the head of the group which proposed this project, Jim Gordon. Especially considering the fact that the choice of location was far from arbitrary:
Mother Nature dictates where you site a wind farm, and Nantucket Sound has some of the best wind resources in the United States," saya Gordon. "[It] is an optimal site to locate a wind farm that can produce at peak output all of the electrical requirements of the cape and islands, without any pollution emissions, without any water consumption and zero waste discharge.

Their objections to the wind turbines, which would have lowered energy bills for thousands of ordinary people, were on the grounds that they will destroy the "unspoiled" beauty of the area. It was a revealing glimpse into the true nature of these people.

RFK Jr. is also the president of the Waterkeeper Alliance, a New York based environmental group, which ascribes to the doctrine of global warming caused by CO2 emissions. The wind turbines would not emit any greenhouse gases.

If one were to follow Mr. Kennedy’s line of, “For They That Sow the Wind Shall Reap the Whirlwind”, logic, the question of what those like him should reap is an interesting one.

The Best of America

2005-09-02T22:57:00.000-07:00

Too many of the stories on Katrina have focused on the worst aspects of humanity. While there are villains a plenty, there are also many heroes. Rescue workers, National Guardsman, & ordinary people doing extraordinary things. Here are the links to their stories. If you have a story you'd like to add to this post, please add your link to the Haloscan comment section.

Katrina Relief with Efficiency, Love and Hope

Houston Opens Two More Refugee Centers

Update:
A Soldier's Perspective with photos of National Guardsman doing great things. Via Mudville.

Baldilocks with an example of how real men behave: they find soultions & protect the weak.
Jabbar Gibson, 20, said police in New Orleans told him and others to take the school bus and try to get out of the flooded city.
Gibson drove the bus from the flooded Crescent City, picking up stranded people, some of them infants, along the way. Some of those on board had been in the Superdome, among those who were supposed to be evacuated to Houston on more than 400 buses Wednesday and today. They couldn't wait.
The group of mostly teenagers and young adults pooled what little money they had to buy diapers for the babies and fuel for the bus.

Homefront Hugs USA offering comfort to the youngest victims. Information of how to participate in the effort.
The children from Hurricane Katrina need a smile and a hug ! If you want to help - here's what we can do....the children need a smile and a bit of comfort yesterday but we will start today.We plan to deliver it to them in the shelters here in Pensacola and to the Red Cross in Alabama and Mississippi to distribute...Via Mudville

Rep Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee voulnteers in Mississippi with her family.
For the past two days my family and I have been in Mississippi volunteering alongside the Red Cross and other aid organizations offering assistance to those affected by Hurricane Katrina. No words can capture the sense of loss shared by so many. The scale of this disaster is overwhelming... Via Lance in Iraq

Wal-Mart President and CEO Lee Scott contacted President Clinton and the WhiteHouse and committed $15 million from Wal-Mart to jump-start the effort.
As part of this commitment, Wal-Mart will establish mini-Wal-Mart storesin areas impacted by the hurricane. Items such as clothing, diapers, babywipes, food, formula, toothbrushes, bedding and water will be given out freeof charge to those with a demonstrated need.
Wal-Mart previously donated $2 million in cash to aid emergency reliefefforts and has been collecting contributions at its 3,800 stores and CLUBS,and through its web sites [www.walmartfacts.com, http://www.walmart.com/http://www.walmartfoundation.org,/ http://www.walmartstores.com/ http://www.samsclub.com]... Via the Conservative UWA guy

Lowe's will increase to $2 million from $1 million its commitment to matchcustomer donations made to the American Red Cross Disaster Relief Fund. Lowe'sactivated its in-store customer donation program on Monday to benefit the RedCross at all of its more than 1,125 locations nationwide...

Darelen Rutladge opens up her three bed room apartment to 30 evacuees...

Cat House Chat donating five dollars for every comment. Via Ogre's Politics

Ordinary People Go Beyond The Call
"They said … they needed boats," he tells Smith. That's all Josh needed to hear to haul his boat 2½ hours to the waters in downtown New Orleans. "(I've) come to save lives," he says. It took just a few minutes for Josh to accomplish his mission, and hoist a wheelchair-confined grandmother from a flooded hotel to safety. Moments later, he did the same for her infant granddaughter. Her family had defied evacuation orders so they could stay by the grandmother's side. Via Combs Spouts Off. Via Stop the ACLU.

A profile of Fred Vogel a Red Cross volunteer.

Jill Lopez, her daughter Allie Ordonez, 14, her two elementary school-aged sons and her mother Joan Lopez are opening their home to longtime family friends from Waveland, Miss., about 60 miles outside of New Orleans, who lost everything in the aftermath of the hurricane...
Support from the community has also been trickling in, Lopez said. Greenville Elementary School has offered free counseling to Elizabeth and Hanna, and twin beds for both the girls have been donated, as well as some clothing items...

Terry Hatchitt is among 150 volunteers mobilizing from the Red Cross' Great Lakes Service Region - which includes Indiana, Kentucky, Michigan and Ohio - to help with disaster assessment, shelter operations, family services and support. One of seven such specially-trained volunteers from the Clark County Chapter, Hatchitt is no stranger to disaster relief...

Hoosiers ready to help hurricane victims Seventy REMC linemen from across Indiana gathered in Hamburg on Wednesday to begin a two-week mission in parts unknown....
"We're going to be dealing with alligators, cottonmouths, rattle snakes, mosquitoes and irate customers," said mission coordinator Terry Adkins of the Indiana Statewide Association of Rural Electric Cooperatives. "This isn't going to be a picnic."...

New Washington students assisting Katrina victims
...This desire to help those affected by Hurricane Katrina is behind a contest at New Washington High/Middle School....
Progress will be tracked on a poster, designed by freshman Cheldon Mott, in the school's main hallway and when the school reaches the goal of $1000 a party will take place.
"Additionally, the 4 Corners Mini Mart and New Washington State Bank in New Washington have agreed to place collection buckets in their business so that the New Washington community can help the school reach its goal," Wright said.

Utility Workers Come From Afar to Help Their Brethren Start Restoring Service
Convoys of utility trucks and reinforcement workers from as far away as Massachusetts and Ohio are arriving in the gulf states to help restore electricity to the estimated 1.6 million household and business customers still without power in the wake of Hurricane Katrina....
"You volunteer to go with the understanding that it's at least two weeks," Steve Daquila, the leader of the ConEd unit, said by cellphone yesterday on the way to Birmingham, Ala...

Resources on the effort in Houston.

Common people doing heroic things
...Their homes under water and destroyed, rescue workers had to put their own losses out of their minds as they plowed through filthy water saving people’s lives. Men dangled from helicopters and dodged power-lines and tree limbs to pluck people of off rooftops...

Web sites help loved ones find each other.

Phin's Blog auctions blog designs. Via Basil, Point Five

The military's efforts to help the victims of Katrina as well as reliefe information for members of the military & their families. Via Mudville

Americans Open Homes to Katrina Refugees
...Across the nation, people like Rainey are offering up their homes as temporary shelters to the storm's refugees. On the Web site craigslist.org, hundreds of people — some from as far as Oregon and New Hampshire — are eagerly offering free or extremely cheap room and board for victims, even knowing those strangers may stay for months...

Creative Solutions For Temporary Housing The International Council Of Shopping Centers (ICSC) has put out an email to its members appealing for shopping center owners with vacant space to contact the Department of Homeland Security. Empty big box stores, like old Wal-Marts, are proposed to be used to house gulf coast refugees. This is the creativity of American business at its best. The utilization of this vacant space for our fellow Americans will be a critical support pillar in the ongoing effort to cope with the damage of Katrina. Via Froggy Ruminations.

Update II: 300 troops with kin in Katrina zone sent home
Three hundred Air Force members in Iraq and Afghanistan and elsewhere abroad will return to their Mississippi Air Force base "so they can attend to their families' needs after Hurricane Katrina," according to an Air Force command statement...

TEXT
STORIES OF SURVIVAL
By Michelle Malkin

TheRTO Trainer is going to join the relief efforts. Wish him well.

And What Did Clinton Do?

2005-09-02T15:44:00.000-07:00

The EU Rota fisks Sidney Blumenthal's Speigel article on Katrina.

Hat Tip: Chrenkoff

Update: The Right Nation has posted an interesting article from TCS on global warming & Katrina.

Update II: Via James S. Robbins of the NRO. [In the Army,] there are 1,012,000 soldiers on active duty, in the Reserves, or in the National Guard. Of them, 261,000 are deployed overseas in 120 countries. Iraq accounts for 103,000 soldiers, or 10.2 percent of the Army....
If you add in Afghanistan (15,000) and the support troops in Kuwait (10,000) you still only have 12.6 percent....
So where are the rest? 751,000 (74.2 percent) are in the U.S. About half are active duty, and half Guard and Reserve...
The DOD response is well ahead of the 1992 Hurricane Andrew timetable. Back then, the support request took nine days to crawl through the bureaucracy. The reaction this time was less than three days officially, and DOD had been pre-staging assets in anticipation of the aid request from the moment Katrina hit.....

And here's the kicker: A year ago after Hurricane Charley, the president was accused of responding too quickly, allegedly to curry favor with Florida voters.

Academia & Ground Zero NYC

2005-09-02T14:04:00.000-07:00

Candace de Russy has a must read article at the NRO on the International Freedom Center. She wonders how Gov. Pataki's request that the center administration arrive at a plan which would:
"guarantee" that its cultural and educational programming will neither disparage America nor offend the victims' families

Particularly:
[s]ince primary responsibility for these programs has already been handed over to the higher-education establishment, it is doubtful that the IFC guarantee will be honored. Academics cannot even guarantee a fair treatment of contentious issues on their own campuses, so why suppose that they can protect the integrity of debate in other institutions?

As a recent study, "Politics and Professional Advancement Among College Faculty" by Stanley Rothman (emeritus professor of government at Smith College), S. Robert Lichter (professor of communication at George Mason University) and Neil Nevitte (professor of political science at the University of Toronto) shows:
When professors are asked about their political outlook, they call themselves liberal about four times more often than the general public. In some departments (English literature most of all, followed by philosophy, political science, and religious studies) over 80 percent of the faculty calls itself liberal and under 5 percent calls itself conservative. This disparity has prompted "a substantial shift to the left" since the mid-1980s, and is still increasing.

They also uncover solid evidence of active discrimination against those who hold conservative views:
...even when professional accomplishments are equal, a more liberal outlook predicts "a significantly higher quality of institutional affiliation." They even assign a number to this liberal edge: "The ideological orientations of professors are about one-fifth as important as their professional achievements in determining the quality of the school" they work for. This means, Robert Lichter told an interviewer, "Republicans get worse jobs than Democrats." Conservative complaints about "liberal homogeneity in academia deserve to be taken seriously," the authors conclude. They also state that their findings "suggest strongly that a leftward shift has occurred on college campuses in recent years, to the extent that political conservatives have become an endangered species in some departments."

Indeed, such behavior raises the disturbing possibility that the higher education establishment might not be worthy of the trust placed upon them.

Update: The treatment of some Iraq War vets on campus. My apologies to all our service men & women.

Kids- Don't Try This At Home

2005-09-01T20:01:00.000-07:00

Several bookstores, local artists, the American Civil Liberties Union of Utah, various Internet service providers and others filed the original lawsuit against the state in June, attempting to prevent anti-pornography enforcement by the new law.

The law, which Shurtleff calls "The Truth in Porn Law," requires Internet providers to "truthfully identify material that is harmful to minors," he said. "However, it doesn't restrict anyone's access to the Internet unless they request it."

House Bill 260 requires Internet providers to make a filtering system available by January 2006, which consumers can activate if they choose. By May 1, 2006, Utah-based Internet content providers will also be required to identify adult material according to regulations prepared by the state. On the same date, the law requires the Attorney General's Office to prepare a list of "adult content" Web sites that consumers can ask their Internet provider to block.

The law is intended to offer consumers viable protection in the form of an optional filtering system, not one that would be forced upon every user. The requirements would have no effect on Internet users who choose not to block any sites.

Shurtleff said HB 260 differs from federal law and other state laws, some of which have been found to be unconstitutional, in that the consumer, not the government, decides whether a site is blocked.

The law would apply the "harmful to minors" standard to the Internet, a standard that has been used for books, magazines, art and movies for nearly 30 years. It is also only directed at Internet service providers doing business in Utah and Utah-based Internet content providers that post material which may be harmful to minors.

Those involved in the lawsuit claim the law violates constitutional rights and could inaccurately put them on the registry with content that is constitutionally approved for adults.

In Tuesday's response, the state mentioned the U.S. Supreme Court has upheld the "harmful to minors" standard and cites a report to Congress that "server-based" filters are the most effective way to keep children from gaining harmful material on the Internet.

"Why would the ACLU want to stop parents from protecting their children from Internet pornography," said Jerrold Jensen, assistant attorney general representing the state in the lawsuit. "We have 'adult only' sections in magazine stores. Why should the Internet be different?"

Indeed, this is hardly censorship. Thank goodness that the judge in this case is appears to be a sensible one who is considering dismissing the ACLU's case.

Hat Tip: Bob G

Blogging For Katrina's Victims

2005-09-01T13:47:00.000-07:00

Hugh Hewitt (spelling corrected :) proposed that bloggers dedicate today's post to helping the victims of hurricane Katrina. Considering the slow responce of several major companies to Katrina's victims (h/t: 44 South Street), I am more than willing to join in.

Upon recovering from the shock of hearing casualty estimates, I felt a terrible pang of regret for never having visited New Orleans when I had the chance. It was a place I had always wanted to experience- the music, the food & the beautiful architecture. It was a lesson on the ephemeral nature of beauty & the folly of procrastination.

While many have been behaved in a manner so brave & noble that they stand as a credit to all of humanity, some have displayed the worst of human characteristics. I cannot help but look back at the NYC blackout in 2003, where despite the chaos, there was very little looting & rampant crime. The possibility of terrorist involvement as well as the experience of 9/11 no doubt had a sobering effect on the city.

As for the Kosmanauts, the DUmp & company, I refuse to dignify their tripe by exerting the effort to refute them.

To help the victims of Katrina, I will be donating to the Salvation Army, a charity which I have seen do a lot of fine work & one which spends the monies entrusted to them efficiently as well as Soliders Angels who are helping military families affected by the disaster. They need not only money, but also diapers, personal care items, clothing as well as a variety of other necessities to help the refugees. The affected families will also need help re-establishing their lives.

I pray that no one will need to use this, but this is the link to the Missing Persons Board. In an unrelated note, if anyone has had any news of Sulfuric Attitude, please leave a comment or email me. We miss the H2So4, can't wait to have you get back in the blogosphere my friend.

My thoughts & prayers go out to all the victims of Katrina & their families. God Bless America.

Update: I don't want to point fingers, but this picture raised my blood pressure a tad.

A Crisis They Cried

2005-08-31T15:25:00.000-07:00

Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) has declared that Niger is in a state of crisis, as has the UN, following intense criticism from this group. In an effort to maintain the appearance of doing something, Kofi Annan, (whose son Kojo & brother Kobina are being investigated in connection to the oil-for-food scandal) has toured Niger & promised more aid.

But, is aid the answer? The flood of foreign aid creates economic problems by driving down the price of locally produced grain & produce, forcing farmers who might otherwise be self sufficient into poverty. It also leads to the governments of the recipient countries to become less reform oriented as they lose the incentive to do so.

Ironically, it may even cause hunger, as has happened in some villages where the men have locked up the surplus grain & forbidden its consumption by their wives & children in order to receive aid. These men have an excellent understanding of the workings of aid agencies & are happy to exploit them. The women & children of Niger are paying the price. Would it not be better to address the cultural factors that cause starvation?

In Niger, 47.3% of the population is under 14, & nearly 60% of the young people are under 18. Girls typically get married at fifteen or less & are pressured to have many children. Polygamy, which is allowed by fundamentalist Islam, as well as the exhortations in the Koran to propagate the faith through procreation, are cited as the major contributory causes for the high rate of population growth.

The traditional dietary & childrearing practices have an impact as well. Their diet is mostly limited to millet. Not only do they not eat fresh vegetables & fruits & fish, they also lack the knowledge of how to prepare such dishes. Mothers are asked to dispose of the colostrum during the first few days following the birth of a child. This is the most nutritious part of the breast milk, as it is saturated with proteins and other substances that boost the immune system. Infants are weaned very quickly, despite evidence of its adverse affects on children. Young children are also refused eggs due to a cultural belief that it will prevent their becoming thieves. They also tend to be the last to be fed during the daily meals, long after the father and mother.

It is a shame how political correctness & multiculturalism forbid us from implementing truly effective policies aimed at addressing the true roots of hunger in Niger as well as other areas.

Another oft overlooked aspect is the role of the aid agencies in perpetuating the image of crisis. I found the observations of Dr. William Easterly very astute:
"I think NGOs and rich country media do have an incentive to paint too simplistic and bleak a picture, as was the case in Niger's food crisis,"
The comments of Tony Vaux, a former coordinator of Oxfam's global emergency programmes, should also be considered:
Once an emergency is identified, he says, the NGOs' public relations machine takes over and "there is a terrible temptation to look around for the very worst stories"
Mr. Vaux notes that the money spent on the publicity for famines & other diasters would be better spent on actual action.

Indeed, as I argued in an earlier article, organizations, including those, which operate under the aegis of humanitarianism including MSF, AI, Oxfam as well as the UN agencies are not above having ulterior motives & self-serving agendas. They are not immune to the affects of the monies, which follow a splash of publicity not only to the organization it-self, but also the individual members. It is might be wise to take the yowlings of movie stars, rock bands, aid agencies & the MSM with a grain, or perhaps a heap, of salt.

HAT TIP: La Shawn
update: Carl

An Officer Has His Say

2005-08-31T15:06:00.000-07:00

Jay would like to help this police officer tell his side of the story.

No Bias Here

2005-08-29T13:35:00.000-07:00

The study, to be published this fall in The Georgetown Law Journal, analyzes 11 years of records reflecting federal campaign contributions by professors at the top 21 law schools as ranked by U.S. News & World Report. Almost a third of these law professors contribute to campaigns, but of them, the study finds, 81 percent who contributed $200 or more gave wholly or mostly to Democrats; 15 percent gave wholly or mostly to Republicans.

The percentages of professors contributing to Democrats were even more lopsided at some of the most prestigious schools: 91 percent at Harvard, 92 at Yale, 94 at Stanford. At the University of Virginia, on the other hand, contributions were about evenly divided between the parties. The sample sizes at some schools may be too small to allow for comparisons, though it bears noting that by this measure the University of Chicago is slightly more liberal than Berkeley.

Still think they is no bias in our education system?

The article goes on to try to down play the implications of this study by citing the examples of Justice Scalia, Justice Thomas & Judge Roberts. However it does concede that:
Law schools are sort of organized in a club structure, where current members of the club pick future members of the club.

This is true not only for law profession, but others as well, as the experineces of David French show.
During my second interview with the director of the program I was applying to join, she asked the following question: “I note from your CV that you seem to be involved in religious right issues. Do you think you can teach gay students?” How many gay applicants at Cornell have been asked: “Do you think you can teach Christian students?”....

Nor was my experience with ignorance and prejudice limited to faculty hiring. One of the most disturbing aspects of my experience at Cornell Law School was the year I spent on the school’s admissions committee. I saw a Christian student once almost get rejected despite tremendous academic qualification because members of the committee were wary of his “God-squadding” and “Bible-thumping.” He was admitted only after I raised strong objections to the committee’s obvious anti-religious prejudice. I also saw some Latino and African-American candidates receive less affirmative action assistance because their perceived politics or career interests (such as an interest in finance) were deemed “less diverse” than other applicants with an obvious interest in “social justice.” Moreover, some applicants of color who indicated interest in the world of commerce were said not to have “taken ownership of their racial identity.”

It's high time for the Ivory Tower to stop hiding behind the facade of objectivity & come to terms with the fact that they are biased. If academia is to persist in tolerating ideological bias, they will find them-selves trusted less & less.

Negotiating With Terrorists

2005-08-28T15:00:00.000-07:00

The Gaza withdrawal was going to being peace & security to Israel right?

Sun Aug 28, 2:16 PM ET
BEERSHEVA, Israel (AFP)

A Palestinian blew himself up while trying to board a bus in southern
Israel in the first suicide attack since the evacuation of settlers from Gaza, puncturing hopes that the historic pullout would break the cycle of violence....

The militant groups Al-Aqsa Al-Martyrs Brigades linked to the mainstream
Fatah movement and the Al-Quds Brigades of Islamic Jihad jointly claimed the attack, in an anonymous telephone call to AFP.

Yassar Arafat founded Fatah, & Fatah endorsed Muhmoud Abbas.

Meanwhile:
The leaders of the Group of Eight gave strong support Friday to a new initiative to give $3bn a year in aid to the Palestinian authority once Israel withdraws from the Gaza Strip this year.

No firm decisions on the aid package were taken at the G8 summit in Gleneagles. But diplomats from some non-UK countries suggested that significant momentum had built up among the leaders to agree a package this year.

President Bush will be asking to increase the aid package to Palestinians to $350 million. (h/t:Atlas Shrugs)

I wonder what the fate of this new infusion of funds will be? The likelihood that it will be no different from that of all the aid given during the past fifty years is all too high. And the security situation is no different either.

Thoughts from Italy & Sweden

2005-08-27T14:06:00.000-07:00

A Man, an Italian blogger of the site, The Right Wing Nation, in response to my comments on the behavior of the Italian Red Cross, mentioned the decisive role played by the MSM & socialist culture of Italy in influencing attitudes towards America. Otismaster, another Italian blogger had similar thoughts on this issue. It reminded me of an email interview I had the privilege of conducting with a blogger from Sweden. I will repost it here. The original is entitled Swede's Eye View & was published on 7/18/05.

The second interview with Mark Styen, by John Hawkins of Right Wing News was as phenomenal as the first. It was conducted via email. In it, Mr. Styen made many astute points, however, one in particular struck me:

John Hawkins: For the time being, the European public seems to have turned against the idea of creating a "United States of Europe." Do you think the wishes of the European public will be respected, will they change, or do you think Europe's elites will push on for a united Europe regardless of what the people want?

Mark Steyn: What we're likely to end up with is backdoor piecemeal imposition of the bulk of the European Constitution. The EU’s so-called "democratic deficit" - the remoteness of the unaccountable unelected governing class - is, as they say, not a bug but a feature. It was set up that way because, after the massive popularity of Nazism and Fascism, the post-war European elites decided that it was necessary to build institutions that restrain the will of the people rather than express it. In the long run, that's merely a more leisurely and scenic route back to where they came in.

It was upon reading this that the situation in Europe began to make sense to me: the structure of the EU & the strident opposition to it by the populace. Therefore, despite not being of John Hawkins caliber, I decided to do my own interview, via email, with a blogger from Sweden, Fredrik, who is much smarter at his age of nineteen than I ever was. As he was kind enough to tolerate me & answer my queries, I have gained much insight into the condition of Europe & the sources of its anti-Americanism. I am confident that you will find his replies to be as thought provoking as I did.

NYgirl: Fredrik, do you agree with Mark Steyn on his views of the democracy deficit in the EU & it's reasons? Is Europe, in general, more wary of democracy than America? What about Sweden?

Fredrik: I most certainly do, EU's democratic deficit is enormous and I really can't understand why Brussels is so surprised that the constitution was rejected. For ONCE EU citizens where allowed to have a say on the EU and answer was quite obvious. The U.S. is in many ways a democratic role model and Europe has plenty to learn, in Sweden for example our influence over larger issues is basically zero. We've had some 7-8 referendums for the last hundred years, which pretty much tells you how our democracy works. We have our say every four years, the same party wins and things go on as usual. Europe might have given the world the word "democracy" but we haven't grasped the concept as much as we should. I've never really felt that Europeans are more different than Americans, it's just that Americans where blessed by their founding fathers whereas Europe wasn't.

NYgirl: Do you think that the party based system common throughout Europe contributes to the disfranchisement of Europeans? It seems to me that voting for a party rather than a person offers more opportunities for political monopolization. Also, do you believe that the socialist economy, with its intimate ties between the state & private sectors, plays a role in this deficit? Have you noticed a difference following the inception of the Internet? Have there been any Rathergate type incidents in Europe?

Fredrik: Well, it's kind of a joke to hear MPs argue since their opinions rarely matter. I've always believed that individuals, not parties, should be given the final call, the power to make decisions. In our parliament they follow orders (this tradition is mostly common on the left) and they rarely object. So you're right, it undermines the democratic process, which indeed is sad. As for the socialistic economies, well, Europeans in general are heavily regulated with few rights against the state so it's not just the economy. It's the overall attitude we have against politics, which I blame socialism for. I don't believe the European model is anything worth saving, whereas I also see that the U.S. has its problems. The main difference is that the U.S. has been a democracy for a lot longer and your experience with the democratic system is far more delicate. Europe is a democratic region, we are, but there is plenty of stuff we could do to improve what we have. The "social model" is the first thing I would like to abolish for example. As for Rathergate type of incidents, there most certainly have been thousands of them but we don't have the same tradition as you have. Most and foremost European media rarely treat facts with much decency. You should have been here during the November election. The European media WAS A PART OF KERRYS CAMPAIN! It was a disgrace, terrible and so utterly wrong to do so, but still none cared, everybody hated Bush just because. No good reason is given - they simply use the word hatred to make things simple.

NYgirl: Yes, I heard of the Euro press support for Kerry. The anti-Americanism shocked me. You said a very interesting thing: "It's the overall attitude we have against politics which I blame socialism for” I read in a book about France that discussing politics at the family dinner table is taboo, thus the spouts of radicalism. What about in Sweden? Also, do you think that the mainstream Euro press is representative of the European public in general? The American MSM has a liberal bias not shared by many, is it the same in Sweden?

Fredrik: You should take into consideration that these are the thoughts of a nineteen year old. I am in no way to be considered a pundit on the subject; I just feel that socialism has forced Europe into some kind of naive attitude towards politics. It is for example completely impossible to have a discussion about the U.S. with most Europeans. They don't know a thing; to them the U.S. is "The Right Nation" with capital R and thus a terrible place to live in. And since we all watch Hollywood movies, which is totally out of touch with the average American we tend to believe the reality Hollywood gives us. This creates a weird picture about American politics and your country in general and when you have a president like George W Bush that tells it like it is Europeans get irritated. Swedes are generally fairly interested in politics even though our political climate is so much different than yours. In Sweden and throughout Europe you serve the party and you only advance if you have proven that you are a loyal servant to your party. Rhetoric’s is rarely an ingredient. I for example have never engaged in politics since I don't like the system, I simply don't feel that individuals can have very much influence over politics in general. Blogging has been my rescue thank God :)As for the European press I would say that they reflect the political nature of many Europeans, one could say they stand in the "middle" between Europeans on the left and the ones on the right. I often blame European press for being very liberal (and studies have shown that 70% of all Swedish journalists vote left), and that fact is specifically true when it comes to the US or for example Israel. Reading articles about Israel is like reading a leftwing blog. Some would say that the press don't share the view by the European public and some would say they do, I say that it's not much of an issue - the press will always be for the elite and there is not much you can do about it. "What man knows, man sees" as Goethe said. The media will always be accused of being biased regardless of where on the political scale you are. Of course I think media gives a leftist perspective that is pretty common among intellectuals to do that but at the same time you can always listen to DailyKos and their angry rants on the "right wing media"...

Please visit Fredrik's excellent blog frihet som frihet?. I would like to thank him for not only allowing me the opportunity to interview him, but also, for consenting to my publishing it at this site.

And You Thought Michael Graham Being Fired Was Bad

2005-08-27T11:39:00.000-07:00

Here is an instance of an American, exercising her right to free speech, by writing a letter to her Congressman & getting fired (correction: suspended, I was thinking of Graham) for it. Her name is Jan P. Hall & she is a public school teacher in Florida. The Orange County School Board (new link), a taxpayer-funded institution, decided to suspend her for this.

As La Shawn notes, the firing of Michael Graham from WMAL, though an act of cowardly dhimmitude was not a violation of law, however, this is an instance the individual in question is a government employee criticizing government policy.

Here is the main body of the letter in question:

Please consider my views when you are voting and representing voters.

I believe we must close the doors to all foreigners for awhile (sic) until we get this economy and the schools back on their feet. As a classroom teacher in Florida for 28 years, I know that foreigners are the largest users of our taxpayers' money. Foreigners are taking all of the jobs that poor and little-educated Americans could have. Many people are being paid under the table, and therefore they are not paying their fair share of taxes. Schools are dealing with too many problems with language differences, and time is lost to our American children who have parents who pay taxes. I'm seeing money going to local charities going to Mexican, Haitian, and Mid-Eastern immigrants instead of to the poorer people of American descent.

Our school at Sadler Elementary where I teach is 92% Puerto Rican. Please consider changing the laws and keeping these people home in Puerto Rico. They are trashing Orlando daily.

These P.R. children are holding American children back academically, and Puerto Rican teachers can keep getting extensions on their temporary certificates so that they are allowed to teach without proper training. I can truthfully say that Puerto Rican teachers at my school ask me continually for help with math, as they do not get but the equivalent of a fifth grade education in Puerto Rico. They almost always can do no algebra and rely on the system to get by.
I find that Haitian children are more aggressive in the classroom and have not been to school regularly. Their poor conduct is yet another real problem.

In Winter Haven, FL, a large orange grove area with Mexican migrants to do the work, jobs that poor blacks and poor whites used to take are filled by Mexicans, who I am told bring in drugs and disease, such as incurable TB, for the most part.

I know that the solution is difficult, but other countries protect their borders and do not allow foreigners to take citizens' jobs. Please do not allow criminals to stay, as they are filling the jobs in FL.

Update: Links to the Orlando Sentinel & Local6 News, which has video clips, for local coverage of the issue.

Show me the Money

2005-08-26T12:10:00.000-07:00

Some thoughts on the Gaza withdrawal & where all the aid money went.

I've Been Tagged

2005-08-26T11:01:00.000-07:00

My friend Greta tagged me for a game of tag by the numbers. So here goes.

10 years ago: living in NY & in public school

5 years ago: still in NY (yeah!) & in college

1 year ago: juggling way too many things

1 day ago: working, studying, blogging, recovering from an encounter with a roach & a bee

5 Favorite snacks: chocolate, spicy guacamole & boule bread (my contribution to the food world), potato chips, cake, ice cream & cookies

Songs I know the words to: none. I hum tunes & rarely sing out the words

What I would do with Five Million Dollars: take a vacation, pay off husband's & my education expenses, buy a decent house, start a business, cars, release my inner Imelda

5 Places I would escape to for a while: Russia, Australia, China, Tibet, Kenya & Tanzania (I want to see the Masai)

5 Things I would not wear: jeans below the hips, organza, slogan T's (of any persuasion), things that make me look even shorter (I'm vertically challenged :), itchy things, uncomfortable things

5 Favorite T.V. Programs: The O'Reilly Factor ;) , Dr. 90210, most things on the Cartoon Channel, Scrubs, CSI

5 Greatest Joys: my husband, my parents, my in-laws, good books, furry animals amendable to cuddling

5 Favorite Toys: coffee machine (does that count as a toy?), computer & laptop, camera, phone, just about anything that goes fast

Human Events in England & Sweden

2005-08-26T08:55:00.000-07:00

In England:

London Zoo unveiled a new exhibition -- eight humans prowling around wearing little more than fig leaves to cover their modesty.
The "Human Zoo" is intended to show the basic nature of human beings as they frolick throughout the August bank holiday weekend.
"We have set up this exhibit to highlight the spread of man as a plague species and to communicate the importance of man's place in the planet's ecosystem," London Zoo said.
The scantily-clad volunteers will be treated as animals and kept amused at the central London zoo with games and music.
"I actually think the fig leaves will be enough to cover us up, it's no worse than a swimming pool," said volunteer Simon Spiro, 19, from New Malden, south of the British capital.
Spiro, selected from dozens of hopefuls in an Internet competition, said he was excited by the prospect of monkeying around on the zoo's Bear Mountain.
"I'm a veterinary student so the idea of working for a zoo was something that appealed to me.
"I thought it would be fun and interesting because I'm an outdoorsy kind of person," he said.
Brendan Carr, 25, from Aylesbury, southern England, wrote a poem in his bid to get on the mountain.
"I'm funky like a monkey and as cool as a cat, talk more than a parrot, up all night like a bat," it went.
"I got a laugh like a hyena but get the hump like a camel, so cover me in fig leaves as I'm the ultimate mammal."

In Sweden:

The city library in Malmo, Sweden's third-largest city, will let curious visitors check out living people for a 45-minute chat in a project meant to tear down prejudices about different religions, nationalities or professions.The project, called Living Library, was introduced at Denmark's Roskilde Festival in 2000, librarian Catharina Noren said. It has since been tried at a Copenhagen library, as well as in Norway, Portugal and Hungary.
The people available to be borrowed also include a journalist, a gypsy, a blind man and an animal rights activist. They will be available on Saturday and Sunday in conjunction with a city festival, and are meant to give people "a new perspective on life", the library said in a statement....
It is also located just a narrow strait away from Denmark, and centuries of warfare between the countries has been replaced with a friendlier rivalry in recent decades. Still, both nationalities have several stereotypes about their neighbors.
"Danish Radio called to ask what prejudice we have about Danes," Noren said. "They had some tough questions for me."
Interest in the project has been high, Noren said, although the library does not allow bookings - the human subjects will be checked out on a first-come-first-served basis....

Hmmm...

2005-08-25T16:15:00.000-07:00

Italy's Red Cross treated four Iraqi insurgents with the knowledge of the Italian government last year and hid them from U.S. forces in exchange for the freedom of two kidnapped aid workers, a top Italian Red Cross official said in an interview published Thursday....

From the IRC Home Page.
The begining of its mission statement:
The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) is an impartial, neutral and independent organization....

The International Red Cross said it was not involved in or informed of Scelli's activities. It said the Italian Red Cross is an independent organization that doesn't answer to the Geneva-based International Committee of the Red Cross.
"Scelli worked mostly in a personal capacity," said spokeswoman Antonella Notari. "I would not qualify what he did as an Italian Red Cross activity."
Notari would not comment on whether Scelli's initiatives violated the ICRC's pledge of neutrality, saying the commission needed more information from the Italian branch.

Maurizio Scelli, the outgoing chief of the Italian Red Cross, told the Turin newspaper La Stampa that he kept the deal secret from U.S. officials, complying with "a nonnegotiable condition" imposed by Iraqi mediators who helped him secure the release of Italians Simona Pari and Simona Torretta. They were abducted in Baghdad Sept. 7 and freed Sept. 28....

In a statement Thursday, the Italian government stopped short of denying it knew about the deal. It said Scelli acted independently and that the government "never conditioned or oriented his action, which ... was developed in complete autonomy."

The statement also did not directly address if Italy had kept the United States in the dark about Scelli's efforts but reiterated that Italy has always maintained a "full and reciprocal" cooperation with its American allies in Iraq.

Update: commentry

Scraping the Bottom of the Barrel

2005-08-25T14:52:00.000-07:00

Code Pink (whose co-founder Medea Benjamin expressed support for the Communist Viet Cong in Vietnam and the Nicaraguan Sandinistas, as well as saying of her trip to Cuba, "It seem[ed] like I died and went to heaven") has organized a demonstration outside Walter Reed.

Of course, America being a democracy, they do have a Consitutionaly protected right to engage in this type of activity. My thoughts on the issue are best express by Kevin Pannell, a member of the Army's First Cavalry Division:
"distasteful."

He went on to say:
When he was a patient at the hospital, Pannell said he initially tried to ignore the anti-war activists camped out in front of Walter Reed, until witnessing something that enraged him.

"We went by there one day and I drove by and [the anti-war protesters] had a bunch of flag-draped coffins laid out on the sidewalk. That, I thought, was probably the most distasteful thing I had ever seen. Ever," Pannell, a member of the Army's First Cavalry Division, told Cybercast News Service.

"You know that 95 percent of the guys in the hospital bed lost guys whenever they got hurt and survivors' guilt is the worst thing you can deal with," Pannell said, adding that other veterans recovering from wounds at Walter Reed share his resentment for the anti-war protesters.

"We don't like them and we don't like the fact that they can hang their signs and stuff on the fence at Walter Reed," he said. "[The wounded veterans] are there to recuperate. Once they get out in the real world, then they can start seeing that stuff (anti-war protests). I mean Walter Reed is a sheltered environment and it needs to stay that way."

But, there is hope yet. One demonstrator did concede that a hospital might not be the most appropriate venue for this kind of event:
"Maybe there is a better place to have a protest. I am not sure," said a man holding a sign reading "Stop the War," who declined to be identified.

HAT TIP: Wizbag, Sister Toldjah, Say Anything
Also: The Man, Katie's Dad, Gary, H2So4

The Vietnamization of Iraq

2005-08-25T11:59:00.000-07:00

Dadmanly, a milbloger, discusses the media efforts to revive the Vietnam Syndrom far more cogently than I could. (H/T: Blogotional)

Here are numbers on how Vietnam vets felt about their country & their service.

Update: The Tampa Tribune responds to criticism of its coverage of Iraq (H/T: Pebble Pie)

Blogs & The Two Front War

2005-08-24T09:52:00.000-07:00

Cpt. Sherman Powell's now famous response to Matt Lauer offers wonderful insight into the conflicting visions of those actually doing the task & those merely reporting about situation. While it is true that a majority of MSM journalists are biased against the war, I believe that there are other factors at play as well.

The MSM is a business; their true goal is ensuring their own continuity. In order to increase sales, they seek to sensationalize minutia to create stories with a "buzz". The result is succinctly put in the oft-heard mantra, "if it bleeds, it leads". Michael Yon calls the basic model of war reporting, SIGACT: Significant Actions. Insurgent attacks & casualties from IED's & VBIED's make the news, but US soldiers helping a little girl by giving her crucial medical attention or bringing school supplies, shoes & clothes to kids does not.

He points to another factor, which prevents the good deeds of our soldiers getting the publicity they deserve:
Most of the acts of kindness I witness are done from an instinctive altruism that almost always seeks anonymity. And there is that other problem with catching people doing good--the cynical media is quick to ascribe cheap motivations to soldiers who reveal their humanity through their decency. And does anyone really care about the soldiers who, after having arrested a suspected insurgent, then spent the next twenty minutes trying to find a home for the two little puppies he was keeping?

Also, how "embedded" are these embedded journalists. What is the proportion of time spent at their hotel in Baghdad, as opposed to sparsely appointed military bases & the terribly uncomfortable & dangerous battle field? The war correspondents, who were really stationed in hotels in Pakistan, wearing Kevlar vests & field gear while giving their reports, as if they were in the middle of a battle field, during the Afghan War, are to me a wonderful example of how much war reporting is really done.

The reasons given for this sad state, in Iraq, is the danger of being kidnapped by insurgents, bandits, IEDs, the difficulty of finding trustworthy bodyguards, ect. ect. ect.... All the excuses offered sound to me, like that of the proverbial kid telling the teacher 'the dog ate my homework'. The fact that Michael Yon can, with a fraction of the budget of war correspondents from the major networks, offer far better coverage than all of them combined is very telling. Talent & courage obviously go a long way.

Another issue is, who is talking to journalists & how do the journalists interpret it. Lt. Neil Prakash offers an example:
....Funny thing about the media and soldiers. Try to interview any one of my soldiers and they will shake their heads and slink away. None of us like talking to the media. I always wonder whose side the media is on. When I read stories about how the carbomb is the enemy's weapon of choice and it's their version of a "smart bomb" etc etc, it freaks me out. Yeah ok, maybe these are no secrets but for the love of God, stop glorifying the enemy tactics so much. It just encourages them more. The media has few vessels for conveying the news - FEAR and CONTROVERSY are just two. What cheap and lousy tactics. The other reason we hate talking to the media is because we feel like douchebags when we do. My guys are real soldiers, and real soldiers hate the spotlight. It's usually POGs talking to the media. (Unless your chain of command makes you talk to them because it's good for PA).
Here's the difference between a POG and a trigger puller. I remember being in the DFAC at Camp Fallujah and overheard this one guy talking about how pumped he was about killing Iraqis and their babies. I thought he was a hardcore killing psychopath until I asked him. He was a commo guy responsible for keeping the internet site up on the camp. Real trigger pullers don't talk like that...

Despite all their talk of sensitivity & the importance of understanding other cultures & their way of life, most journalists have yet to understand that the military has its own culture. They live a different life-style & have different codes of conduct. Ever heard uncensored doctor humor? It could easily be misconstrued by one unfamiliar with their working conditions. They are hardly unfeeling or insensitive, however, they are faced with extremely stressful situations on a daily basis & must find a means with which to cope. The situation in the military is much the same.

Of course the people who would be most able to understand military culture would be former members of the military, yet they are often labeled as biased & dismissed. While it is certainly possible for former service members to have a pro-military bias, it is also possible for those who had never been in the military to be biased against the military. Bias is a two way street & many in the field of journalism fail to acknowledge this.

Journalists are an interesting group of creatures: they disseminate information to the public on subjects about which they have very little actual knowledge. I find it rather amusing that "professional" journalists deride bloggers as amateurs in pajamas, when in fact "real" journalists themselves rarely tend to be experts on the subject about which they report.

Had it not been for the milblogs & Michael Yon's online magazine, the gloom & doom pictures offered to us by the MSM would have escaped substantial challenge. As T6 writes of the "news” broadcasts he saw of Iraq while on his two-week break back in America:
In a perfectly measured voice the anchor rattled off the number of bombings and Iraqi and US casualties like she was reading off the results of a local baseball game. "Today in Iraq insurgents set off three massive explosions targeting Iraqi troops" came the anchors voice as the camera panned over a smoking crater "resulting in 43 Iraqi casualties" she continued as the camera swept over the splintered remnants of the ruined neighborhood. "In Mosul US soldiers died, bringing the total of US personnel killed to…." At that point I turned away. It was too much, listening to that disembodied voice pick through tragedies like a vulture....
I didn’t think back to that clipped broadcast until I returned to Iraq. Here in the throbbing heart of Baghdad, swimming in a sea of shimmering heat - that news segment seems almost disingenuous. I’m sure that yesterday, half a world away that same newscaster spent 10 or 15 seconds covering the latest insurgent ambush before moving onto the local weather forecast. And I’m equally certain that someone watched that broadcast and grew a little more despondent about the situation here in Iraq. But what was lost in that syrupy smooth slice of news was a story that shows just how much Iraq has changed, and about how disciplined some Iraqi Army units have become in a few short months...

Indeed, if the situation in Iraq was so bad & the morale as abysmally low as the "polls" claim, why is it that the rate of re-enlistment is at record levels? In fact:
Every one of the Army's 10 divisions — its key combat organizations — has exceeded its re-enlistment goal for the year to date. Those with the most intense experience in Iraq have the best rates. The 1st Cavalry Division is at 136 percent of its target, the 3rd Infantry Division at 117 percent.
Among separate combat brigades, the figures are even more startling, with the 2nd Brigade of the 2nd Infantry Division at 178 percent of its goal and the 3rd Brigade of the 4th Mech right behind at 174 percent of its re-enlistment target. This is unprecedented in wartime. Even in World War II, we needed the draft.

And no, it’s not the money. Only 60% of those who re-enlisted received bonuses, even then, the amounts ranged from $6,000-$12,400. 643 with highly specialized skills, most likely Special Forces members, received $57,000. All the amounts are a fraction of what these patriotic men & women could command in the private sector.

And as Lance in Iraq (who in civilian life is the Press Secretary for the House Republican Caucus in the Tennessee Legislature, thus an official member of the chickenhawk vast right wing conspiracy) points out, the majority of the soldiers in Iraq aren't part of the crowd clamoring for an exit date:
“We came here to do a job and then go home, whether that takes 10 years or even 15 years,” said Spc. Allan Annaert, from Headquarters Support Company, of the 94th Engineer Combat Battalion, (Heavy), which is stationed in Mosul, Iraq....“It’s going to affect me because I just re-enlisted, but I don’t mind coming back here,” said Spc. Charles Welling, also of the engineer battalion. “We’ve got a job to do, and we’ve got to finish it. I already anticipated coming back again, and I’ll be ready for it.“If we started this to help [Iraq], then we’ve got to finish. If that takes until 2010, then it takes until 2010.”

The situation has gotten to the point were even the AP & the NYT cannot ignore their skewed reporting practices. At a recent editors meeting at the AP:
...Some editors expressed concern that a kind of bunker mentality was preventing reporters in Iraq from getting out and explaining the bigger picture beyond the daily death tolls...
(Read the whole article, the stupidity is stunning)

Looks like the adage that the first casualty of war is the truth was right. She was grievously injured by the mainstream media; but our milbloggers & their supporters aren't about to let her go that easily. On the other hand, if they continue this pattern, the MSM will find them selves suffering even more than they already are. While many of us are extremely grateful our men & women in uniform, it is sad that they must fight a two front war: one against terrorism & another against the media.

Note: This is the second part of the Blogging series. Part I here.

HAT TIP: Mudville, Wizbang

Update: more on recruiting, media bias, re-enlistment

The first hand accounts of Iraq are available not only via milblogs, but through books like this one:
SOLDIER LIFE: A DAY IN THE LIFE OF AN AMERICAN SOLDIER
New Book Detailing the Everyday Life of an American Soldier's Experience with The War on Terror from LBF Books

PITTSBURGH, PA , Aug. 18 - LBF Books to publish Soldier Life: A Day in the Life of an American Soldier (ISBN 1-885093-44-6 ). The book details the author's experiences while deployed and back home, weaving a gut-wrenching, heartfelt tapestry of experiences and emotions unique to soldiers' living and dying in this war. American Soldier's work comprised of elements drawn from his critically acclaimed and widely read weblog ( www.soldierlife.com), aims to bring the grim, yet human face of war to readers everywhere.

The author, writing under a pseudonym to protect his identity, delivers a first-person account of the constantly changing world of an American Soldier attempting to balance both family and responsibility while enduring the reality of war. Soldier Life: A Day in the Life of an American Soldier chronicles the events engulfing modern day patriots, and the hardships he willingly endured to ensure safety and security of family and country left behind.

Soldier Life: A Day in the Life of an American Soldier is required reading for those looking for an intimate insight into the minds of fathers, husbands, and warriors serving in this war.

LBF Books plans to release Soldier Life: A Day in the Life of an American Soldier in December, 2005.

American Soldier & LBF Books will be donating a large portion of the proceeds to Soldiers Angels ( http://www.soldiersangels.org/) and Operation Troop Appreciation (http://www.operationtroopappreciation.org/). Both organizations are federally recognized programs that assist Troops abroad with care packages and items needed while deployed.

Contact: LeeAnn Lessard
LBF Books, Public Relations
Pittsburgh , PA
613-797-7578
leeann.lessard@sympatico.ca
www.lbfbooks.com

Also, there is a band of rockers in Iraq :-) To listen to sample clips & buy their CD, please visit: http://www.iraq-songs.com/

To hear the voices of actual Iraqis: the movie Voices of Iraq. If not available through your local video store or www.netflix.com, plase visit the website http://www.voicesofiraq.com/. Nehring the Edge has a great review of this movie.

Pat Robertson & Hugo Chavez

2005-08-23T13:52:00.000-07:00

The second part of the blogging series will be posted tomorrow, as I've found my-self a bit overwhelmed by a few things. Therefore, today I would like to hear your thoughts on Pat Robertson's recent remarks on Venezuela’s dictator, Hugo Chavez. I must confess that I am of two minds on this one.

Here are Pat Robertson's words:
“You know, I don’t know about this doctrine of assassination, but if he thinks we’re trying to assassinate him, I think that we really ought to go ahead and do it,” Robertson said. “It’s a whole lot cheaper than starting a war ... and I don’t think any oil shipments will stop.”.....
“We have the ability to take him out, and I think the time has come that we exercise that ability,” Robertson said.
“We don’t need another $200 billion war to get rid of one, you know, strong-arm dictator,” he continued. “It’s a whole lot easier to have some of the covert operatives do the job and then get it over with.”....

The Smart Christian says:
Although Chavez is a real and preasent danger, it goes without saying that Robertson's comments will be used by many to shame the follower of Christ.

On the other hand, Chavez is a brutal dictator, who has no qualms about crushing those who defy him & is holding his people hostage to poverty & oppression. It is also highly likely that he supported bin Laden with more than a birthday card. All who live in a democracy, both Christians & non-Christians, & are able to enjoy its benefits do have an obligation to share their gift with others. Sugar coating the truth is never helpful, Hugo Chavez is an evil tyrant & should not be allowed to continue terrorizing the people of Venezuela.

What say you?

Update: The reaction of the Venzuelan MSM & bloggers.

Blogging

2005-08-22T12:44:00.000-07:00

We all bemoan the bitter partisanship that has divided our country recently. The ideological divide, which lurked dormant pre 9/11, became impossible to ignore during the war on terror. It has made us more aware of the biases that permeate some of our major institutions, & heightened our awareness of the impact of these biases on our lives. The war on terror forced us to confront the fact that a major segment of our MSM does have a liberal bias. Not only do they have they a liberal bias, but they harbor an active hostility towards America, her traditions & the military.

The claim that ‘the media isn’t biased’ certainly runs contrary to the wisdom of the numbers:
....[T]he new study by the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press found the national media to be 34 percent liberal and 7 percent conservative.

That's more than four liberal journalists for every one conservative journalist. CNN, NBC, CBS, ABC v the lonely Fox, seems an ever apt analogy.

The audience, recognizing the bias, has rated the credibility of the MSM at an all time low: In 1985, 84 percent said they could believe most of what they read in their daily newspaper, but by 2004 that number was down to 54 percent.

And now the death knell:
Blogs Attract Young, Wealthy Readers: that demographic & socioeconomic group much coveted by media outlets & courted by the advertisers who ensure the financial solvency of all the major media outlets of all mediums.

As Huge Hewitt predicts: Before long corporate America will be calling search firms to find candidates for new positions dealing exclusively with new media, and boards of directors, long used to consulting or recruiting from politics and the mainstream media, will be debating how to persuade Betsy Newmark or Stephen Bainbridge, LaShawn Barber, or Joe Carter to advise (or even join) their ranks.

Indeed, the blogosphere, fed by discontent & entrepreneurial spirit, is growing ever more rapidly. However, despite its success, the blogosphere has not eliminated the MSM. While blogs may be more trusted, they are, due to the financial & professional limitations placed on them, still forced to get the content of their news from mainstream sources.

A vast majority of bloggers, being unable to attain a sufficient income from their blogging activities, & thus having to maintain 'day jobs' in order to pay the bills, as well as contending with time & other resource limitations with which to conduct the independent investigations placed upon them, consigned themselves to an editorial role. However, the events of the Rathergate incident began to break down this wall. Bloggers began to realize that not only can they criticize the old media, but they can attack it with its own tools.

Yet, despite this moment in the sun, while bloggers were able to expose the fraudulent charges for what they were, they remained unable to push any further into the story. They were not able to ascertain who created the documents & how they arrived at CBS. Thus the blogosphere remained, while relevant & trusted, still an editorial organ, rather than a journalistic one.

And then along came Al Franken's Air America with a yen for re-distributing resources...

Michelle Malkin was quick to jump on the story, & with the help of Brian Maloney, conduct an investigation of the sordid deeds. Their investigation resulted in landing Air America landing in legal & fiscal hot water. This was indeed a full-scale journalistic investigation. Of course, the NYT (no doubt seething with jealousy & fuming with rage) only covered the story as a minor trifle, by relegating it to the B section & entitling it Bronx Boys Club's Finances Investigated. The more prescient NY Post gave Ms. Malkin & Mr. Maloney the opportunity to present the results of their investigation in a full page editorial, entitled 'Money Pit' on Aug 22. (Bug Me Not, for those who don't wish to register)

Her fine work has garnered Michelle Malkin's blog the coveted top spot in the TTLB, surpassing Glenn Reynolds. This investigation is a major milestone in the transformation of blog content from editorial journalism, to investigative journalism. As a bloger, albeit a mere ranting editorialist, I cannot help but hope that this will mark the beginning of a long series of investigative stories by blogs. It will be interesting to see how the FCC responds to this transformation.

The major hurdle to blogs transforming from editorial to investigative is the lack of advertising dollars, which flow into blogs, despite their audience. Ms. Malkin is able to blog full time due to the proceeds of her highly acclaimed books. Bloggers without books (sounds like the name of a group :) must rely solely on the proceeds of blog ads. In order to allow these bloggers also the resources to investigate in Ms. Malkin's capacity, the amounts earned in advertising by bloggers must increase. How this is to be done, remains a question.

While the blogosphere is by no means exclusively conservative, a majority of blogs are of a conservative slant. One of the major factors for the credibility of bloggers is that they are not "hired" by anyone. A fact, which renders rants like this one,
...2. Michelle Malkin - Far-right affirmative action hire who is so bigoted she'd arrest herself for trying to cross a border. Famously published a book praising internment of Japanese-Americans that was (a) incoherent and (b) probably not written by her. If she didn't have tits, she'd be stuck writing at Townhall.com...

which was posted in a liberal blog & entitled Conservative Blog Taxonomy, to put it mildly, hilarious. (On a side note, there are no comparable left wing female bloggers)

Indeed the bloggosphere, unbound by the shackles of political correctness & affirmative action, has allowed individuals to succeed on the basis of merit. This, IMHO, marks the major difference between blogs & mainstream journalism. Despite their recent genesis, blogs have had a tremendous impact on our culture. How far reaching this will be? And what will the nature of the future relationship between blogs, the MSM & advertisers? For the answers to these questions, I'd like to toss the crystal ball to you my fine readers.

HAT TIP: La Shawn, Basil, Mudville
Topic of next post: Blogs & the Iraq War.

Letter From Bin Laden to the Sleepers

2005-08-21T15:15:00.000-07:00

To all al Qaeda agents (both field and USA sleeper cells):

I especially want all agents who have successfully infiltrated USA colleges, public organizations, local neighborhoods, and American political groups to follow my instructions in this message.

There is no way that we at al Qaeda can fight America's tremendous military power and hope to win. These infidels, under George W. Bush, have amassed more financial means to fight us than any other country. Therefore, we must spend our limited financial resources on political and terrorist strikes. Thanks to our friends in Iran and Syria, we can continue our terrorist strikes to drive these American devils out of the Middle East so we can, once again, have Iraq under our thumb. We can easily create another "Saddam" to control the locals.

Bush and his political friends are afraid to strike either Iran or Syria, even as a warning. At least, Clinton would send an occasional Cruise Missile to look as if he was doing something.

Americans are weak and easily fooled. During the Vietnam War, when our friends, the Viet Cong, thought that they had lost the battle in their Tet offensive, they were about to surrender. Then, they heard the American newsman, Walter Cronkite, announce on the CBS news that the USA had lost in this offensive, and they were amazed. Our friends simply decided to continue to fight, to hang in there, knowing that the American voters would become easily depressed and demand that their leaders bring home their troops and stop fighting. It worked; the Americans gave up.

It was here that I, your mighty Osama bin Laden, learned how Americans could be manipulated to give up. Their leaders make decisions not for that which will benefit the greatness of their country but rather by voter polls that may determine who will be in power in any upcoming election. We have enough appeasers now in political office to help us. Our public relations campaign for "political correctness" has worked well. We have these American puppets afraid of offending anyone.

Our prolonging the war in Iraq by attacking both the Iraqi citizens and the American troops via terrorist bombs and booby traps is working. The Iraqis are fearful, as they watch the American protestors strut and shout on American and al-Jazeera TV, that the American weaklings will leave them to suffer by getting their poll-watching politicos to withdraw all troops!

We, at al Qaeda, can hasten this by causing more trouble in America. Our front organizations on the Internet and with members buried in some of the leading American media are doing a good job in stirring up dissent amongst the voters.

I urge you to get more Americans, especially mothers of dead or wounded soldiers to demand to see the president and to plead with television audiences to stop this "unnecessary" war. One mother's weeping face on American television can do more than twenty suicide bombers to drive the infidels from the Middle East!

Even though we have Rush Limbaugh, Bill O'Reilly, and Brit Hume against us, we still have the power of the vast media giants, including the New York or LA Times and its columnists, the network newscasts and their Sunday News shows all apologizing for us or presenting our victories or political views. How can we lose?

Via Gibbit & Gina, writen by Lee Ellis

Break the Monoploy

2005-08-21T13:32:00.000-07:00

They protect terrorists, support the sale of child pornography, pedophiles, the KKK, neo-Nazis but are offended by the sight of a cross or the sound of a prayer.

As a result of wealthy donors & your tax dollars, they are an organization flush with funds, well equipped to advertise in ways to garner support.

Let's not let them monopolize the channels of information. Support the effort to place an ad challenging the ACLU.

HAT TIP: Jay

This Is All We Were Missing

2005-08-20T13:18:00.000-07:00

“My soul has been searching for you since I came into this world.
“All my life I have had this emptiness inside, like a part of me was missing and I was incomplete ...
“And now I can’t imagine my life without you ... Even if I have to share you.”

Yes, they're finally here, a greeting card for the cheating heart. The company is in talks with the Clinton & Kennedy camps regarding endorsement deals.

Russia’s long winter will just fly by for a herd of Russian cows which, a newspaper reported on Tuesday, will be fed confiscated marijuana over the cold months.
Drug workers said they adopted the unusual form of animal husbandry after they were forced to destroy the sunflowers and maize crops that the 40 ton of marijuana had been planted among, Novye Izvestia daily reported.

Milk sales in Russia skyrocket: surpasses vodka as drink of choice

Planet Today Show Gets a Reality Check

2005-08-19T14:32:00.000-07:00

LAUER: Don't get me wrong, I think you're probably telling the truth, but there might be a lot of people at home wondering how that might be possible with the conditions you're facing and with the insurgent attacks you're facing... What would you say to people who doubt that morale could be that high?

CAPTAIN SHERMAN POWELL: Well sir, I'd tell you, if I got my news from the newspapers I'd be pretty depressed as well.....

For those of us who have actually had a chance to get out and meet the Iraqi Army and Iraqi police and go on patrols with them, we are very satisfied with the way things are going here and we are confident that if we are allowed to finish the job we started we'll be very proud of it and our country will be proud of us for doing it!"

(video available: Windows Media and Real Media)

HAT TIP: Chrenkoff, Mudville Gazette, Eco9er

Addressing the Illegal Problem

2005-08-19T10:49:00.000-07:00

The declaration of a state of emergency by the governors of New Mexico & Arizona, both Democrats, speaks volumes of the extent to which this problem has ravaged our nation. The solution that many politicians, both Democrat & Republican, are proposing is that of guest worker programs. Yet polls show that a majority of the American public, including a sizable number of the native born Hispanic population, opposes the guest worker programs that our politicians favor.

Despite the cries that illegals contribute to the economy, the fact that tax payers have been forced to subsidize then in numerous ways, shows that they are drain on resources as well. The fact that many are failing to integrate into American society, by learning English & being good citizens, is another troubling factor. While no one can argue that the United States needs immigrants to stabilize our demographics, how we go about this should be addressed in a manner that is not only expedient, but in a way that will pave the way to making our country better, not worse. Here are a few of my thoughts of the subject.

1. All illegals, as the act of entering a country without permission is a crime, must be charged & deported. This will send the message that illegality will no longer be tolerated. As is, police cannot charge & deport illegals unless they have committed another offence, & in some instances are forbidden from asking the immigration status of even suspects. Police must be empowered to ask & verify the immigration status of all suspects & apprehend all illegals who are reported to them.

2. Illegals come to this country & stay due to the willingness of unscrupulous businesses to hire them. The criminality of hireing illegals should be strictly enforced with a large fine for each instance & jail time for repeat offenders. The INS & local police should be empowered & given the resources to investigate & prosecute all cases of illegal hirings that are reported to them.

The immigration status of children should be that of their parents.

3. As there is a need for additional labor & demographic stability, the number of legal immigrants allowed per year, must be increased. However, all those who wish to be eligible for these visas must have at least a basic knowledge of English. Upon two years of arrival, they must pass a language proficiency exam. Those who fail must return.

To oppose illegal immigration is not to oppose all immigration. It is to merely ask that there be controlled orderly immigration & that the immigrants who arrive be assimilated. The Denver Public Library has proposed to make seven of its branches "spanish focused". As Mauro E. Mujica of U.S. English said:

"I fail to see how an 'Official Spanish' Library will aid immigrants in learning English and becoming Americans," Mujica continued. "If anything, it will further the notion that Spanish-speaking immigrants can live in relative comfort without needing to learn our common language. If we are to successfully continue as a nation of immigrants, we cannot send an 'English Optional' message to any immigrant group."

In fact, those immigrants who do make a valuable contribution to their adopted countries are those who are willing to embrace the language & customs of their new country. Blogger Arthur Chrenkoff, an Australian of Polish origin, is a wonderful example. In response to this story, he had this to say:
Not for me to tell the beautiful Colorado how to run their things, but bilingualism annoys the hell out of me. And it's not because I don't like Spanish - or Polish for that matter - or because I like English better, but because in countries built by generations of migrants coming from everywhere around the world, the common language is one of the most important glues that bind us all together.
I came to Australia seventeen years ago, knowing maybe 50 English words. I did not expect any "Polish focused" institutions to keep me in a linguistic ghetto; I wanted to learn the language of the land so I could make the most of the opportunities that Australia could offer me. It's the love of books that got me where I am. I'm looking now at an old notebook, where I wrote down all the words that were new to me together with their translation and phonetic pronunciation. As a teenager, I was fascinated by the unexplained, and one of the first books in Australia that served as my English teacher was a children's book about monsters and legendary creatures. So I look at these words, which were once so new and so strange; "devour", "lair", "hump", "abominable", "ferocious"...
I don't quite agree with Mauro E. Mujica, chairman of the board of U.S. English, Inc., who said that "Denver's action is a dubious first in American history: a major U.S. city is creating a public institution that intentionally excludes native-born Americans," not only because you don't have to be a native-born American to feel excluded from a "non-English-first" facility, but because, even worse than excluding non-Spanish speakers, the brave new Denver libraries would perpetuate the exclusion of Spanish speakers from the mainstream of the American society by downplaying the need for linguistic integration.

Assimilation is the key to realizing the American dream & escaping the ethnic ghetto. Those who do make the effort to learn English, assimilate & become good members of the community should be granted green cards & be made eligible to citizenship. The American people are extremely tolerant & good-hearted people who readily welcome those who do not harm them.

4. Those who arrive on these worker visas must be initially sponsored by an employer who may hire immigrants by advertising for them, should they fail to hire an American citizen or green card holder for the position. However, the employer who does the hiring must accept the responsibility to teach the foreign employee not only the English language, but also the laws & regulations of America. The employer will also be held responsible for the additional costs in education & health care that their immigrant workers & their family members place on the economy.

Should a majority of a certain employer's immigrant employees fail the language proficiency exam, that employer should be barred from sponsoring more immigrants. The employer should also familiarize the immigrant workers with the local zoning laws, which bar over crowding & the attendant slummification it cause which lead to decreasing property values as well as ordinances against littering & unseemly public behavior. This will lead to employers aiding their immigrant employees in their efforts to learn English & integrate into American society.

4. In order to give employers incentives to hire Americans at reasonable wages rather than immigrants, those businesses whose percentage of citizen or green card holder employees to immigrant employees exceeds 10%, must pay a special tax for each additional 5% of immigrants hired.

One of the problems with basing immigration quotas on unemployment statistics is that often, the numbers used are state or nation ones. These numbers fail to take into account the particular circumstances of each locality. Thus, before an employer hires an immigrant worker, he/she should have to apply for a permit to do so from the local government. As it is local governments that must care for these new arrivals by providing their health care, education & attend to many of the problems they might cause, the federal government should cede part of its exclusive control of immigration to local governments.

Of course the greatest argument for hiring illegals thus far is the, 'they do the jobs that Americans won't' argument. However, as Linda Thom, who moved from California to Puget Sound, an area without a large illegal population shows, lack of illegals does not lead to economic collapse. The local economy structures it-self to allow self-sufficiency. One example she offers if that of her experience at the local car wash. Not only does she get the service she wants, but it is offered in a friendly & pleasant manner, & she saves money by having to tip a smaller number of employees:
Here, on this large island, Americans do jobs immigrants won’t do.
For example, I took my auto to the carwash last week. In the five years I have lived on Whidbey Island, I have never taken my car to get it washed but it was parked in the Vancouver, B.C., airport lot for three weeks and a seagull visited…I really didn’t want to deal with it.
Usually, I don’t wash my car as I live on a dirt road in a place where it rains a lot and the car is a late-model Oldsmobile that my husband says could pass for a CIA staff car.
Judging from the looks of local cars and the lack of carwash businesses, most other residents of Whidbey don’t wash their cars either.
I think there is only one auto-washing facility within 30 miles of my house and that’s where I went.
Two clean-cut, young, American men, Andrew and Jay, hosed off the car and helped get it on track for the machine and then they dried it when it emerged. There was a can for tips at the exit.
Contrast this with Santa Barbara, California, where there are probably ten to fifteen car washes and the owners are always getting busted for hiring illegal aliens. The workers speak Spanish and they swarm around the car and they all put out their hands for tips at the end.

The group that would be most adversely affected would be the upper middle class, which has gotten accustomed to having a bevy of servants at their disposal to perform nearly every domestic task for them. I doubt that having to vacuum ones house or mow ones lawn by ones-self will lead to devastating consequences.

She also mentions how the indiscriminate hiring of illegals has harmed mentally & physically impaired Americans by taking away the incentive for employers to accommodate these workers.

The ability to hire adult immigrants also impedes the ability of American teenagers to find part time & summer employment. This is no doubt partially behind the weakening of the work ethic of the younger generation, as well as the difficulties faced by those who wish to take a hiatus from academia by working due to their & a lack of job skills & employment history.

It also means that teenagers have a great deal of unsupervised free time, which parents must fill with a medley of expensive & exhausting activities. Should the parents not be in a position to afford such things, the natural inclination of teenagers to become bored can easily lead to their becoming involved in undesirable activities & groups.

This also creates a problem for college students seeking summer & part time employment.

Dan Morgan, of No Speed Bumps, tells his experiences vacationing in an area without a large illegal population:
.....while on vacation, in the hotels we stayed in all of the maid staff and other help were white. The same was true of all of the restaurants we ate in, from the cooks, to the bus boys, to the grounds keepers. I felt like we were in a time machine and in a strange land.An interesting note about the maid staff at the hotels was the good cheer that they were in. They were constantly chatting among themselves and seemed very content as they went about their work. This reminded me that, yes, there is dignity to manual labor, and yes, white people can still do manual labor.

Not only can Americans still do manual labor, but they are also willing to do it. This will lead to our having a more balanced society in which all work will be valued & the gainfully employed imbued with a sense of dignity & all members of our society able to communicate with each other & make a positive contribution to society. The need to address the illegal issue is especially keen in light of our war with Islamic terrorists who have entered the United States via the Mexican border.

HAT TIP: La Shawn Barber, No Speed Bumps, Chrenkoff, American Housewife, Basil, Mudville

Update:A multidrug-resistant tuberculosis (MDR-TB) brought in by illegals in California.
"Treatment for MDR-TB is very expensive -- ranging from $200,000 to $1.2 million per person, over an 18- to 24-month time period," said Dr. Reuben Granich, a lead investigator for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, during a press conference in the District yesterday.
Illegal Crime Wave.
How racism in Mexico contributes to illegal immigration.
California urged to follow New Mexico & Arizona.
Illegals given a ranch as result of lawsuit claiming Minute Men "traumatized" them. On the politics behind it.
Tax payers of Hendorn Virginia forced to pay for facilities to house illegals. La Shawn covers this too.
Update II (8/22): Illegals & the drug trade.

Failing to Concentrate

2005-08-18T14:52:00.000-07:00

I decided to take a peek at the OpJ during a break (bad, bad), & lo & behold, there was an article there that I had to post.

She Does Not Speak for Me by the father of Spc. Kyle Andrew Griffin, who died in the service of his country & its mission to bring democracy to all the nations of the earth.

Update: Move America Forward will be conducting the "You Don't Speak for Me, Cindy" caravan beginning next week. It will feature military family members who have loved ones serving in the war against terrorism in Iraq or Afghanistan. The delegation will be led by Deborah Johns of Marine Moms.

Arthur Chrenkoff also features more voices of grieving parents of American soldiers who disagree with Cindy Sheehan.

Just as she has a right to express her views, so do others. These families should be given the same media coverage as Cindy.

I Apologize

2005-08-16T14:03:00.000-07:00

Sorry guys, I won't be posting today & the next two days. There are a couple of things I have to attend to, but I will return on Friday: so be sure to drop in then :-)

What Planet Are These People From?

2005-08-15T17:28:00.000-07:00

I couldn't help asking myself that question when I read these two items about Katie Couric (hat tip: Ex-Donkey) and PETA (hat tip: Dell Gines, Eco9er)

Meanwhile, here in planet earth:
Last year, 1,500 Nigerian Christians were massacred by Islamic fundamentalists, 173 churches were burnt to the ground and 75,000 people were displaced. In the states of Plateau and Bauchi, more than 1,000 widows and 9,000 fatherless or orphaned children were left without much hope as a result of the massacres. (hat tip: Fundamentally Right)

Where's the outrage?

Don't Know Much About History

2005-08-15T12:37:00.000-07:00

The horrors suffered by American POW's at the hands of the Japanese during WW II:

One of the POWs had a ring on and the Japanese guard attempted to get the ring off. He couldn't get it off and he took a machete and cut the man's wrist off and when he did that, of course, the man was bleeding profusely. [I tried to help him] but when I looked back I saw a Japanese guard sticking a bayonet through his stomach.
On the second day, a fully pregnant Filipino woman threw some food out... this POW in front of me picked up the food and started eating it; and a Japanese guard came... and decapitated that POW... and then he went and cut the stomach out of the Filipino woman. She was screaming "Kill me, Kill me," and they wouldn't do it....
It also became clear after the war that the Japanese were responsible for horrific abuses of POWs aboard tankers leaving the Philippines and bound for Japan. These tankers became known as hell ships. The Japanese put masses of men in the holds of tankers and gave them little food, light, room or water. The men died at an alarming rate -- of suffocation, thirst, and madness. They also died of allied bombing , since the hell ships were not marked with a white cross, as specified by the Geneva Conventions, to indicate POWs were on board. The men who survived these tankers became slave laborers in Japanese mines and factories....
It is an astounding fact that while POWs died at a rate of 1.2% in Germany, they died at a rate of 37% across the Pacific.

And yet, there is no Greek chorus on the MSM mourning these events: only Guantanamo & Abu Graib.

Near the end of WW II, when Hitler knew that there was no way he could win, he deployed a submarine a U-235, with a large amount of nuclear materials (enough to make two atomic bombs), to Japan. Shortly after it was sent to sea, Germany surrendered & the submarine arrived at New Hampshire to give it-self up to the US. It is interesting that there is very little mention in the MSM or the syllabi of most schools or college courses of the existence of a Japanese nuclear program & the possibility, though highly disputed, that there was a test in North Korea, which was colonized by Japan at the time.

And yet, there is no mention of this on the MSM: only Hiroshima & Nagasaki & how evil America was to want to end the war & save thousands of lives, both American & Japanese, as well as countless other Asian colonial subjects of Japan. Never mind that had Japan really been prepared to surrender, one bomb would have sufficed.

We are a nation that has forgotten its history. This is partially due to laziness, but also, especially for young people, because history is never taught in a through manner at all levels of education. Multiculturalism & political correctness has taken precedence over facts. Rarely are we taught of all the good things that America has done or the threats she faced from enemies. In fact, any who recognize the threats & insist on acting on them are routinely called "war mongers" or "racists & fanatics". Able Danger told us that there were people who wished to harm us, it told us who they were & yet, the information was not acted upon.

Indeed it is our ignorance of history that allows those who harbor a pathological hatred of America to spread their propaganda. Had we truly been aware of what a real gulag is, would AI's claim have been believed by some? Had we really know what the killing fields of Cambodia & Hitler’s concentration camps were like, would Sen. Dick Durban have dared to make such a spurious claim? Had we been taught about the Japanese nuclear programs as we were taught about Hiroshima & Nagasaki, would there be so much chest beating?

Why is it that our media & education establishments chose to focus only on carefully selected vignettes, which support their ideology? Why do we not know the names of any other mother who lost her son in Iraq other than Cindy Sheehan? Why did the NYT take so long to report the Air America scandal & why did they entitle the article, Bronx Boys Club's Finances Investigated?

We have been much too tolerant of half-truths for much too long. As this nation is a democracy, it is not only the right, but the obligation of every citizen to demand that our history be taught properly & that our media not distort the news.

HAT TIP: Metrolingua, Sailor in the Desert

Illegal Immigration

2005-08-13T13:04:00.000-07:00

Bad News: The towns of New Ipswitch & New Hudson lose the right to arrest illegals for trespassing. The Mexican government paid the legal fees of defense lawyers & hired the New Hampshire ACLU to procure lawyers for the cases. While the American people have lost, the people of New Ipswich may have won in spite of the ruling: "I think they plan on staying out of Hudson and New Ipswich, N.H.," said Randall Drew, one of the illegals lawyers.
(Background Info: here & here)

Good News: Despite much opposition, even from some local Republicans, county commissioner, Robert Vasquez, is continuing his fight against illegal immigration, by using federal anti-corruption laws to prosecute employers who hire illegals.

Vasquez, whose grandfather came from Mexico, complains of an "unarmed invasion" that is fast transforming American towns like this one. "Why," he asks, "should I have to 'Press 1 for English?' "...
"They say these are jobs that no one else will take," says Tim Smallwood, an Idaho fruit and vegetable inspector, as he takes a lunch break in Caldwell. But if employers were denied that pool of cheap labor, overall wages would go up he says.Lori Morrison, who manages a night shift at Jack-in-the-Box to help support her family, shares the worry about wages. And she adds another concern: the social-service burden on government. "Taxes have gone up," she says. "They're killing us."

(Background Info: here)

Many polls show that a majority of the American public is against illegal immigration, as well as guest worker programs. The odd thing is, the Bush administration is pushing the guest worker program as a compromise in an effort to win over the Hispanic population, which has traditionally voted Democrat, & yet some polls show that Hispanics do not look upon the program too favorably either.

In the Sun-Sentinel poll, Hispanics, who made up 15 percent of the respondents, were no more supportive of pro-immigration changes than other groups polled. Only two in 10 Hispanics favored a law allowing undocumented immigrants to work legally in the country. Only two in 10 favored issuing driver’s licenses to undocumented immigrants. And only 38 percent of Florida’s Hispanics who are likely voters said they thought immigration helped the United States....

He said Hispanics who vote are likely to oppose guest worker programs “strictly out of self-preservation. Do you want more laborers fighting for the same jobs?” he asked.

and
recent polls show 45% of Hispanics oppose it, and 63% agree the new plan is geared toward winning Hispanic votes for 2004. Additionally 30% of Hispanic registered voters polled stated they would vote for Bush; down 5 points from the 35% of Hispanic votes Bush had in 2000. Many Hispanics believe Bush's plan is a dead end, rather than a road to the American Dream.

Looks like Tom Delay is getting the message that when you try to please an elite & highly vocal minority, you alienate the silent majority, who are the key to winning elections. (hat tip: Xtreme Right Wing)

Update: Via Gina's Rantings. New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson declared a state of emergency Friday in four counties along the Mexican border that he said have been 'devastated' by crimes such as the smuggling of drugs and illegal immigrants. Read more here.

Update II: Via Gina's Rantings (again :-) Petition to President Bush asking him to secure our borders immediately.

Update III: Ivan Lenin has a few choice words on this issue.

Want To Stop the Out-of-Control ACLU?

2005-08-12T18:04:00.000-07:00

Here's how.

HAT TIP: Jay

The Tragedy of Cindy Sheehan

2005-08-12T11:37:00.000-07:00

Of all the sad stories I have read recently, this is one of the saddest.

A few months after the death of her son, Army Spc. Casey Sheehan, when Cindy Sheehan & her family got the chance to meet the President, she made these statements to a local paper:
"I now know he's sincere about wanting freedom for the Iraqis," Cindy said after their meeting. "I know he's sorry and feels some pain for our loss. And I know he's a man of faith."
She went on to say, of the meeting attended by other military families who had lost a loved one to combat:
The Sheehans said they enjoyed meeting the other families of fallen soldiers, sharing stories, contact information, grief and support.
For some, grief was still visceral and raw, while for others it had melted into the background of their lives, the pain as common as breathing. Cindy said she saw her reflection in the troubled eyes of each.
"It's hard to lose a son," she said. "But we (all) lost a son in the Iraqi war."
The trip had one benefit that none of the Sheehans expected.
For a moment, life returned to the way it was before Casey died. They laughed, joked and bickered playfully as they briefly toured Seattle. For the first time in 11 weeks, they felt whole again.
"That was the gift the president gave us, the gift of happiness, of being together," Cindy said.

And now, a year later she has characterized her meeting with President Bush very differently:
..."He acted like it was a party ... he came in very jovial, like we should be happy that ... our son died for [the President's] misguided policies."

She has also espoused visions of neo-con conspiracy theories & paranoid delusions of being hunted. Her statements:
.... [H]e was killed for lies and for a PNAC Neo-Con agenda to benefit Israel. My son joined the Army to protect America, not Israel...
Cindy says that the protesters will be killed if they stay the night.“We’re not letting them intimidate us. If we get killed out here, know that the Secret Service killed us.”…(Afterdowningstreet.org' s reports from her, DailyKos here)
clearly show that this lady is unwell.

My heart goes out to her. She has lost a child; there can be no grief that is comparable. When such a shocking thing occurs, a person is emotionally fragile & extremely vulnerable. The feelings of grief, loss, anger, fear, disbelief, guilt & a myriad others all course through the mind at lightening speed wreaking havoc in their path & sending the person on an unstoppable roller coaster ride. You blame your-self, you blame your loved ones, you blame total strangers & you blame God in an effort to make sense of not only the tragedy, but also of your own life. The caveat to the saying 'time heals' is that the time in question is rather long one. A year is a very short time in the course of grieving.

During a time like this, as cults know very well, it is very easy to manipulate a person. When comparing the level of rationality of her statements, it is clear that the Mrs. Sheehan, who was not only able to speak cogently but also make the decision to keep her mind open to what the President might say & chose to behave in the dignified manner that she felt her son would have appreciated, a year ago, has undergone a radical change.

What saddens me most is how some bloggers & the MSM are treating this story. On the left, there are those rejoicing in her grief & using it as weapon in their war against Bush. On the right there are some who are catcalling her & mocking her as a moonbat. Ordinarily, if a person made the statements she did, I would too. I am not disputing the fact that she is clearly not well, however, she is a mother, grieving the loss of her child, who has fallen under the influence of a group of malicious people. Such terrible grief can unhinge any of us.

I realize that it is important to counter the lies of the left, however, it is possible to do so in a sympathetic & appropriate manner. I am glad to see so many conservatives doing an admirable job of covering this difficult story. I hope that all conservatives will remain above the nastiness & not give Michael Moore & his cronies the satisfaction of sinking to their level.

HAT TIP: Michelle Malkin

Update: Mohammed of Iraq the Model has a wonderful message to Cindy Sheehan. He asks her to think about the mothers who lost their children to Saddam tyranny & tells of how Iraq is a better palce because of the sacrifices of those like her son. Please read it. (Hat tip: BloodSpite)

Update II: Via Hooah Wife & AOW, Soldiers Against Cindy Sheehan

The Disingenuous Claims of the ACLU

2005-08-11T13:54:00.000-07:00

The ACLU home page. About Us:

The ACLU is our nation's guardian of liberty. We work daily in courts, legislatures and communities to defend and preserve the individual rights and liberties guaranteed to every person in this country by the Constitution and laws of the United States. Our job is to conserve America's original civic values - the Constitution and the Bill of Rights.
The American system of government is founded on two counterbalancing principles: that the majority of the people governs, through democratically elected representatives; and that the power even of a democratic majority must be limited, to ensure individual rights.
Majority power is limited by the Constitution's Bill of Rights, which consists of the original ten amendments ratified in 1791, plus the three post-Civil War amendments (the Thirteenth, Fourteenth and Fifteenth) and the Nineteenth Amendment (women's suffrage), adopted in 1920.
The mission of the ACLU is to preserve all of these protections and guarantees:
*Your First Amendment rights-freedom of speech, association and assembly. Freedom of the press, and freedom of religion supported by the strict separation of church and state.
*Your right to equal protection under the law - equal treatment regardless of race, sex, religion or national origin.
*Your right to due process - fair treatment by the government whenever the loss of your liberty or property is at stake.
*Your right to privacy - freedom from unwarranted government intrusion into your personal and private affairs.
We work also to extend rights to segments of our population that have traditionally been denied their rights, including Native Americans and other people of color; lesbians, gay men, bisexuals and transgendered people; women; mental-health patients; prisoners; people with disabilities; and the poor.
If the rights of society's most vulnerable members are denied, everybody's rights are imperiled.
The ACLU was founded by Roger Baldwin, Crystal Eastman, Albert DeSilver and others in 1920. We are nonprofit and nonpartisan and have grown from a roomful of civil liberties activists to an organization of more than 400,000 members and supporters. We handle nearly 6,000 court cases annually from our offices in almost every state.
The ACLU has maintained the position that civil liberties must be respected, even in times of national emergency. The ACLU is supported by annual dues and contributions from its members, plus grants from private foundations and individuals. We do not receive any government funding.

Sounds good. However, their policy on the Second Amendment seems in contradiction to the above statement. In their own words:
The national ACLU is neutral on the issue of gun control.
They go on to say that were we to allow unlimited & regulated gun & weapon ownership, it would create a state of anarchy. Also that it is their position that the Constitution does not contain barriers to reasonable gun regulation.

On the other hand, this group believes in the legalization of the sale & distribution of child pornography (while making its production illegal), defended NAMBLA, Nazis, & the KKK.

Do they really believe that gun owners, are a greater danger to the country than the members of NAMBLA, neo-Nazis or the KKK?

Of course one can entertain the possibility that the vast majority of NAMBLA members simply attend meetings for the free chips & Coke & read the pamphlets which instruct how to lure young children for the style of prose, & that the vast majority of neo-Nazi members are merely another group of WW II enthusiasts & that the vast majority of KKK members are merely interested in having dinner parties, as is the view of Robert Byrd. As it is not possible to rule out these possibilities, let us, for the sake of argument, accept them. If we were to extend this line of reasoning, would it not be possible to argue that the vast majority of those who wish to own not only guns, but bazookas & missiles, merely wish to do so out of appreciation for their technological or decorative value.

After all, gun owners who number close to 60 million have exhibited a great deal responsibility & restraint. Despite there being nearly 200 million firearms in the possession of individuals, in the year 2000, the number of gun related deaths was 28,663: of these, 16,586 were suicides. It is interesting to note that Japan, which has a virtual ban on all fire arm ownership as a much higher rate of suicide than the Untied States, therefore, to argue that the availability of guns has an impact on the suicide rate would be difficult. Britain has extremely strict gun laws, yet, in 1999, they were only second to Australia in the percentage of people who befall victim to crime & were far ahead of the US with its laxer gun laws.

As part of their defense of refusal to fight gun laws, the ACLU cites a Supreme Court decision & state that they consider reasonable limitations & regulations of gun control acceptable. However, they do not argue for reasonable restrictions on freedom of speech in their defense of perverts & racists. IMHO, you would be hard pressed to find a vast majority of people who do not consider, banning child pornography, placing restrictions on the rights of the KKK & neo-Nazis to intimidate people & the right of NAMBLA to publish books that offer instructions to lure & abuse children & escape, reasonable.

Why is it that the ACLU adopts a reasonable, mainstream position on gun control, while adopting a radical position on the protection of children & all our citizens to be free of intimidation? Why aren't children on their list of "he most vulnerable members of our society" list?

After all, while the First Amendment does state that Congress shall make no law abridging the freedom of speech, it is illegal to reveal the name of a CIA employee, as is it illegal to reveal critical national security information. We as a society have decided that there must be reasonable restrictions on the freedom of speech. This is in accordance to the, ' the Constitution is not a suicide pact' school of thought. Could this line of reasoning not be extended to protecting our nation's children from predators & all of our citizens from intimidation?

By no means am I suggesting that the ACLU is obligated to accept cases that they find objectionable. They are a private organization & thus are free to conduct themselves in the manner in which they please. However, I do contend that for them to call themselves "our nation's guardians of liberty", who work to defend & preserve the Constitution & the Bill of Rights is disingenuous. They are biased & defend only those aspects of the Constitution & bill of rights that they feel are worth defending: why not be honest & admit it?

"Eliminating" the Opposition

2005-08-10T14:05:00.000-07:00

The "pro-choice", as-long-as-you-don't-chose-to-adopt, groups have joined the mudslinging. An ad by NARAL suggests that SCOTUS nominee Judge Roberts, provided legal aid by filling papers “supporting . . . a convicted clinic bomber” and of having an ideology that “leads him to excuse violence against other Americans”.

The ad is false.And the ad misleads when it says Roberts supported a clinic bomber. It is true that Roberts sided with the bomber and many other defendants in a civil case, but the case didn't deal with bombing at all. Roberts argued that abortion clinics who brought the suit had no right use an 1871 federal anti-discrimination statute against anti-abortion protesters who tried to blockade clinics. Eventually a 6-3 majority of the Supreme Court agreed, too. Roberts argued that blockades were already illegal under state law. The images used in the ad are especially misleading. The pictures are of a clinic bombing that happened nearly seven years after Roberts signed the legal brief in question.

I wonder how NARAL believes this happened. Do they think Judge Roberts is a wizard & got hold of a time turner that did survive the DA member's fight against the Death Eaters? Is there something going on that J K Rowling & the Ministry of Magic is not telling us about?

NARAL’s ad not only misleading, but also lying. In fact:
In words and images, the ad conveys the idea that Roberts took a legal position excusing bombing of abortion clinics, which is false. To the contrary, during the Reagan administration when he was Associate Counsel to the President, Roberts drafted a memo saying abortion-clinic bombers "should be prosecuted to the full extent of the law."
In the 1986 memo, Roberts called abortion bombers "criminals" and "misguided individuals," indicating that they would get no special treatment regarding requests for presidential pardons. Reagan in fact gave no pardons to abortion-clinic bombers.

Sure sounds like a supporter of clinic bombers to me.

On the other hand, the superhero, "Dianisis", of a new animated video by Planned Parenthood, says, while standing in front of pro-life demonstrators, that:
"Under the First Amendment of our Constitution they are allowed to express their beliefs…Yet they can sometimes become unruly and sometimes they get a little too close. But mostly I just wish they would disappear...."
and proceeds to take out a gun & shoot the pro-life demonstrators with condoms, which encase the demonstrators for a moment & explodes in a puff of black smoke, thereby "eliminating" them.

Dawn Eden, another girl blogger from NY :-) has a great post on this video with still photos. She also has a link to Saint Kansas, who has posted frame-by-frame stills that show a pro-life demonstrator being decapitated. Lest you think that the violence of the pro-abortion movement is limited to cartoons, please visit abortionviolence.com , which shows that there are many instances of attacks on pro-lifers that the media has chosen to ignore.

Now, just for one second, imagine that the pro-life movement produced a video, aimed at young people, whose superhero brandished a gun at demonstrators & made them "disappear".

HAT TIP: Pat in NC

Click For A Cause

2005-08-10T13:22:00.000-07:00

Chris Muir, of the Day by Day cartoon needs your help. His sister is suffering from cancer & is being kept alive by special therapies from the American Cancer Ablation Center. Please click on this link to give the site a high Yahoo ranking. It will help the clinic raise its visibility with an add on a local CNN special progam on cancer.

HAT TIP: La Shawn Barber, Sister Toldjah

'Mona Lisa' Producers Accused of Bias

2005-08-09T17:37:00.000-07:00

Even as the movie "Mona Lisa Smile" explored stereotypes of female repression at a 1950s women's college, its producers discriminated against 19 female musicians who were paid less than their male counterparts, the U.S. government says.

The Right to Investigate

2005-08-09T13:30:00.000-07:00

As reported by many bloggers, the NYT sought to look at the adoption records of the young children of SCOTUS nominee Judge Roberts. This story has been covered very well by many. However, it did raise a few questions & concerns for me. In response, the NYT issued a statement, which included these lines:
..."Our reporters made initial inquiries about the adoptions, as they did about many other aspects of his background. They did so with great care, understanding the sensitivity of the issue," said Times spokesman Toby Usnik. "We have not pursued the issue after the initial inquiries, which detected nothing irregular about the adoptions."

If they saw making "initial inquiries about the adoptions" as a routine matter, then I'd like to know what other aspects of this man's life & that of his family they made "initial inquiries about". I recall the uproar in the NYT over provisions in the Patriot Act that allow the FBI & Dept of Homeland Security to investigate the library records of those suspected of being dangerous criminals. I fail to understand how a newspaper that considers the violation of privacy abhorrent in the case of a terrorist investigation, justifies a clear & egregious violation of the rights of an innocent man & his family.

As I am not a lawyer, I'd like to know: is it legal to investigate a person's children & how far is a newspaper allowed to go in their investigation of a person?

Also, as one of Michelle Malkin's readers point out in their letters to her, this bottom feeding can be harmful to the children.
It is up to the parents and the parents alone to decide what they tell the kids about their adoption. What if the paper published information the Roberts didn't want to have out there yet, what if the kids at some future date found this information in the public domain, rather than from their parents in a loving, supportive context? What in the bleep gives the NYT the right to usurp one of most important duties of an adoptive parent, that of sharing with the children where they come from?

There is certainly controversy over the extent to which the NYT attempted to dig in their investigation. However, by their own admission, they did attempt to violate the privacy of a man who has not been charged with any crime.

Another disturbing aspect of a statement they sent a reader who expressed concern over the issue was:
Like all major news organizations, we report extensively on the life and career of any nominee or candidate for high public office. Most of the inquiries we make do not report in published articles at all; we would simply be remiss if we did not ask the questions.

I can't help but be curiouse as to what kinds of inquiries the NYT makes about "the life & career of any nominee or candidate for high public office". What is their policy, where do they draw the line & what do they do with the information they do not report?

If & when the government decides to investigate a person, there is an established procedure for such things: there are guidelines, which state what things are permissible & what things are not. They are required to keep records of the investigation, who did what, how & when, as well as archive the information & make the information available to the public, baring extreme instances, even then, it is possible to sue to get access to these records, as the ACLU knows well. The government must also maintain records of who had access to these records. As far as I am aware, please correct me if I am wrong, a privately owned newspaper is not under such constraints & obligations.

It's nice to be worried about Big Brother government looking into your life, but what about the ability of media conglomorates to dig through people's lives. I am by no means suggesting that media organizations not scrutinize candidates for government office, but rather that they divulge the extent & the nature of their investigations as well as what they do with the information that they chose not to publish. I realize also that journalists have special protections that allow them to shield their sources, however, would it be a violation of the Constitution if they were to be required to say, we will investigate X’s educational & professional records from the age of 18 & professional & personal contacts, & the information we discovered will be archived in such & such a manner, at such & such a place, & maintain records of who accessed these records. With the current policy, had Druge not reported this story, we may not have known that the NYT pried into the Roberts family's adoption records.

The NYT states that this type of intrusive investigation is routine for anyone seeking higher office, but what is their policy regarding other people in the news? If I were to be the author of a published book, it could be argued that I am a public figure, therefore, does that give the NYT an open pass to investigate every nook & cranny of my life & that of my family? Should they decide to do a story on me, are there any limits to the extent to which they can violate my privacy? Will I know what aspects of my life they have investigated & how far they have dug? Is it unreasonable to want to know who knows what?

To be fair, the NYT is not empowered to charge anyone with a crime or take any legal action against him or her & therefore does not have same sort of power over an individual's life that the FBI or Dept of Homeland Security does. However, the information that they publish is a matter of public record & can have unjustifiable adverse effects on a person's life. Also, were this information they gather to find its way into unscrupulous hands, there is the possibility of that information being abused. It is not my intention to sound alarmist or paranoid, but the ability to investigate & gather personal information, without the consent of an individual, does concern me, even when it is not the government.

R.I.P.

2005-08-08T19:13:00.000-07:00

Goodbye Mr. Jennings.

A Few Thoughts On Democracy

2005-08-08T13:42:00.000-07:00

All men yearn to be free, thus we hold democracy to be the highest form of government. It is the governance of a nation with the will of the people being its foremost concern. However freedom is not merely the absence of restraints; it also entails the acceptance of responsibility for one's own self, as well as an obligation to respect the views of others. This means, not simply that one allows those one disagrees with to speak freely, but that one accepts their decisions, namely, when the majority vote into office a candidate that one finds disagreeable, it is incumbent upon one, if in the minority, to abide by that decision. It means that while one may speak out against those policies chosen by the majority of citizens of one's country, one must not obstruct or attempt to subvert the will of the people.

Ironically, freedom requires that one voluntarily restrain one self to a greater degree than would be asked in a dictatorship. Many a times, self discipline is far more challenging than the obeying of externally imposed rules, as it requires self-awareness, self-knowledge & a brutally honest assessment of one's own strengths & weaknesses. This is not an easy thing to do.

Perhaps the most dangerous enemy of democracy is hubris. As humans, we are by our nature egocentric. Were we to allow this base impulse to run amuck & hold our own opinion in a higher regard than that of others, it would be very easy to delude one-self into believing that subversion of the democratic process via overthrow of an elected government is justifiable as "I-know-better-than-those-idiots-who-voted-for- (fill in the blank)". In many ways the democratic political system & egalitarian social system hand-in-hand, perhaps this is one explanation for the difficulty in establishing democracy in some places.

One of the most challenging aspects of democracy is accepting the fact that one is bound to accept the choices of others, no matter how much one disagrees with them. As in a democracy, a government of the people, for the people by the people, the people are for the most part the majority, it can be argued that democracy is the tyranny of the majority. It is not easy to accept that a minority, no matter how large, is not justified in overthrowing a majority with whom they vehemently disagree. It means having faith in & respecting all voters of the country: at this time, that even includes Jane Fonda.

In way, being the "losers" in a democracy is a lot like being part of the "loser" crowd in high school. We all want to popular, we all want to be liked, we all like it when everyone agrees with us, & to realize that it isn't so, hurts. The democratic process means that we must all agree to disagree, a concept that is much easier said than done. The practice of democracy, as in any good thing, is challenging.

Yes, democracy is flawed & democracy is difficult, however, it is the best form of government on this earth. It is the only form of government which views all of its citizens as equals, no matter the accidents of birth such race & gender or attained status such as social class. Indeed, it is only in the ballot box of a democracy does the utopian fantasy of eradication of all social distinctions does come true, even momentarily. In there, it is one person, one vote & the vote of a truck driver carries the same weight as that of a Harvard professor. The democratic process serves as a correction for the persistent & inevitable social inequalities. The core ideals of democracy are equality & individual liberty, the noblest of ambitions. It is incumbent upon those of us who enjoy its privileges to defend it & share it with others.

Delayed Reaction...

2005-08-08T12:21:00.000-07:00

Two Jackson Jurors Regret Acquittal

Up North & Across the Pond

2005-08-05T18:07:00.000-07:00

OTTAWA (Reuters) - Canadians can put away those extra welcome mats -- it seems Americans unhappy about the result of last November's presidential election have decided to stay at home after all.
In the days after President Bush won a second term, the number of U.S. citizens visiting Canada's main immigration Web site shot up sixfold, prompting speculation that unhappy Democrats would flock north.
But official statistics show the number of Americans actually applying to live permanently in Canada fell in the six months after the election.

LONDON - Prime Minister Tony Blair proposed strict anti-terror measures Friday that would allow Britain to expel foreigners who preach hatred, close extremist mosques and bar entry to Muslim radicals. "The rules of the game are changing" following last month's bomb attacks, he declared.....
The prime minister said some of the measures will require legislation and that he would consider asking Parliament to reconvene next month — rather than October — to take up the proposals. Other measures, such as broadening the grounds for deportation, can be enacted immediately, but likely will face court tests.
Blair said the government was prepared to amend human rights legislation if legal challenges proved insurmountable
Under the proposals, anyone who preaches hatred or violence could be deported, those linked to terrorism would be automatically refused asylum and steps would be taken to make it easier to strip naturalized citizens of their British citizenship if they preached violence.
The government also will consider a request from police and security services to hold terror suspects for three months without charge. The limit is 14 days. The measures also would extend the use of home arrest for Britons who can't be deported.
New powers would be created to allow the closure of mosques that foment extremism.
Authorities will draw up lists of radical preachers who will not be allowed to enter Britain, and a list of radical Web sites and bookstores. Any foreigner who "actively engages" with those places could face deportation.
Membership in extremist Islamic groups such as Hizb-ut-Tahrir would also become a crime, as would glorifying terrorism.

Oh the irony.

HAT TIP: Shipwrecks, Regular Ron

Fox Guarding the Chicken Coop

2005-08-05T17:54:00.000-07:00

In our Border Patrol & in our airports.

HAT TIP: Cassandra, Our Way of Life

Open Doors

2005-08-04T19:06:00.000-07:00

Looks like a certain open-door advocate wasn't too pleased when people took him at his word.

As Zach says:
Apparently [illegal immigrants] mistook [Rep. Jim] Kolbe's open-door advocacy for, well, a literally open-door policy.

HAT TIP: Our Way of Life

ACLU Sues NYPD

2005-08-04T18:02:00.000-07:00

The ACLU has decided to sue the NYPD over their policy of Random, Voluntary backpack checking on the subways. Given their love for opposing anything that might keep us safe, all I can say is, what took them so long? This policy was implemented two whole weeks ago. Tsk, tsk... the standards are falling. There's only one thing to do about the laziness of the MTV generation of anti-American Commi-lovers: Blame Bush!

As Gribbit at Stop the ACLU points out, the Constitutional basis for their suite is rather shaky, as the Constitution only prohibits unreasonable searches & seizers. The numerous incidences of Islamic terrorists delivering bombs via backpacks offers a good argument as to the reasonability of the policy.
1. The method of choice of most terrorists is the suicide bomb.
2. There have been 4 successful and 4 unsuccessful attempts on subways and buses within the past 4 weeks.
3. We haven’t had an attack on US soil since 2001.
4. Our mass transit systems are a prime target and wide open to attack.
5. New York has the largest subway system in the world. Attacking it would yield massive numbers of casualties. 6. Bomb delivery seems to utilize backpacks and other carry-on type bags.
7. New York refuses to use racial profiling to conduct the searches. So they are being conducted randomly.

Personally, I find the randomness of the checks themselves insane. But, since it is the fashion, & we take great efforts to never be deemed unfashionable, I guess that's the way to go. Here is a wonderful piece on how "Random Fever" is taking all of New York by storm & revolutionizing the way the city is run.

HAT TIP: Stop The ACLU, Alarming News

They Hate Us. They Hate Us. They Really, Really Hate Us

2005-08-03T12:48:00.000-07:00

Well, maybe not them: U.S. soldier's aid to Iraqis earns him title of sheik

But I get a funny feeling he does: "The president and his right-wing Supreme Court think it is 'okay' to have the government take your house if they feel like putting a hotel where your house is,"

Hat Tip: Salt, Captain's Quarters, Glenn Reynolds

Update: As I thought the comments for this post were particularly interesting, I have decided to post them.

Justin Gohn said...
I wonder if that story about the soldier getting the title of sheik will make the NY Times?
1:40 PM

Dan Trabue said...
I'm curious, do you agree with the eminent domain decision? That seems like one conservatives should be opposed to, right?So it's just Dean's tone you dislike in his screed, but not the particular point you have quoted above?
2:00 PM

Mwalimu Daudi said...
As the article you linked to pointed out, it was the liberal wing of the Supreme Court (Justices John Paul Stevens, David Souter, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen Breyer, and Anthony Kennedy) that were the majority on the Kelo vs. New London case. Funny how conservatives get blamed for everything liberals screw up.
7:08 PM

shipwrecked said...
Nice one Mwalimu!The thing with Dean, is that he walks and talks, but little commonsense comes out of him. To think this oaf was almost the Democrat's Presidential Candidate!
10:30 AM

Dan Trabue said...
I agree that Dean has presentation problems. However, I'd take his policy stances over Bush's or Kerry's any day. My real pick was a Kucinich/Moseley Brauner ticket, though. Carol/Kooch! Carol/Kooch! Carol/Kooch!
11:09 AM

NYgirl said...
Hi Justin & welcome. LOL, the truth has never been a paramount concern for the NYT. If you're interested, Micheal Yon, in his online journal, has wonderful converage of Iraq.I'm glad to see you've found your ideal ticket Dan :) I'm for Condi for Pres, but still open on the veep. But do you think that presentation is the only problem Dean has, the quote I posted is clearly incorrect. He is the chairmen on the DNC, shouldn't he be a little more resposible?
2:32 PM

Dan Trabue said...
I have no great opinion on Dean except that he's too conservative and not especially voter-friendly, which is not necessarily a bad thing. I'm tired of voter-friendly candidates.Responsible? If you think the leader of your country is a war criminal and ought to be stopped and slightly more than half the country isn't concerned about it, then I think a bit of yelling is in order.Wake up! He's a war criminal! that kind of thing...Anything less would be irresponsible if that's what you think, right?
2:52 PM

NYgirl said...
Dan Darling, we are a democracy, & in a democracy the will of a majority of the people is the most important consideration.
3:31 PM

Dan Trabue said...
Actually, we are a republic, but that's nitpicking. But that's the problem with democracy, isn't it? They tyranny of the majority?That's why, while there were doubtless some Germans opposed to Hitler, Germany as a whole fell behind him...because the majority supported his notions or were too weak-willed to actively oppose them.And, as a person of faith and, aside from that, a person concerned about justice, the will of the majority is certainly not the most important consideration. What is righteous and just is the most important thing and we must fight for that, even in the face of the tyranny of the majority, right?
7:04 PM

Mwalimu Daudi said...
Howard Dean is too conservative? It's a pity that Stalin is dead, and Fidel is not in great health these days.
7:28 PM

NYgirl said...
Acctualy Dan, Hitler was appointed to his post, his party won 37% of the vote, hardley a majority of voters. One of the first things he did after ascending to power was eliminating democracy.I don't know if you've noticed, but Hitler came to power in 1933 & was in power until 1945, & there weren't too many democratic elections in Germany during that period.Glad you decided not to nickpick on the democracy v republic thing. That topic can get so tiersome :)If you don't like democracy, what would you prefer?Mwalimu, LOL. You have the most amazing sence of humor.
8:05 PM

Dan Trabue said...
This is exactly what I'm getting at (Mwalimu's joke). Yes, of course it's funny but it's also misleading. The joke is associating "More liberal" with more evil. As a joke, that's fine. I laughed.But that's the tone of so many of these more conservative blogs, which suggests you're not listening to the facts, not listening to people like me who are engaging you in conversation. It's often as if you believe the joke.My point on Hitler was not that he was freely elected. My point is that a people, any people, can overthrow or at least work to overthrow any tyrant, and they can succeed IF the numbers are great enough. AND they can do it peacefully.For instance, if the 50-ish million people who voted against Bush were as convinced as I am that Bush is a war criminal and therefore must be stopped, we 50 million could stop him. All we'd have to do is some united act like stop paying taxes or stop driving. Actions like that would bring the government to its knees - drastic actions to be sure. But if you are dealing with a war criminal that ought to be stopped, then drastic actions are needed.So you see, I DO believe in democracy - the people in action - not the corporate-controlled plutocracy we have here in this country.Now, if you believe in the theory of redemptive violence and think drastic actions are needed, you'd have assassinations and civil wars, things of that nature. Fortunately, those of us opposed drastically to Bush are by and large peacful in our approach.My point, though, is that the Germans could have stopped Hitler if sufficiently opposed to him. They weren't, they didn't.
5:51 AM

NYgirl said...
Dan, from what you're saying it sounds to me like you oppose democracy. What about the fact that the MAJORITY of voters did vote for George W Bush? It means that a majority of Americans do think that he acted properly & is not a criminal.Yes, democracy is the tyranny of the majority.If a minority were to attempt to subvert the will of the majority, that would be a dictatorship.As for the Gremans overthrowing Hitler, as the examples of so many dictatorships, where they don't hold democratic elections show, it's not that easy. And as for tone, though I did not comment, I did read the July 29th post in your blog.
11:28 AM

Mwalimu Daudi said...
Dan, it seems rather easy to be an armchair revolutionary and say, "Germans could have stopped Hitler if sufficiently opposed to him." The bad news is that the revolutions you talk about are seldom benign or peaceful. Often they replace one evil with another even worse evil. I hold up the former Soviet Union, Cuba, Vietnam, and Iran are Exhibits A, B, C & D.And in the cases of Nazi Germany and Iraq, it was outside military forces that brought down Hitler and Saddam - not refusing to drive cars or pay taxes.By the way - are the 60 million or so who voted for Bush entited to "stop" Democrats the way you feel entitled to "stop" Bush? Just want to know the ground rules here.
1:12 PM

Dan Trabue said...
If a TINY minority attempts to subvert the will of the majority it's a dictatorship. If a huge minority does it, it's civil revolution. It's a scary concept and I'd only push it in case of an out-of-control dangerously criminal leader such as a Hitler or a Bush.And I'll concede calling conservatives "nuts" (as I did in the July 29 post you mention) is name-calling, it was directed at friends of mine in a amiable sense. Not that an innocent bystander could tell.I'll plea Satire, as well.
1:13 PM

Dan Trabue said...
Sorry, I posted that last one before Mwalimu asked me if it's okay for a group to try to overthrow another group in a democracy. As I said above, it's a dangerous, scary concept, but called for in the case of a criminal presidency. Don't you wish that Germans had broken the law and overthrown Hitler before he got out of control?[Necessary caveat: I'm not saying Bush is comparable to Hitler (I think of Bush as more of a compassionate fascist). I'm saying that Bush committed war crimes for which he should stand trial. I'm saying US citizens are in a similar position as WWII Germans in that they're allowing a criminal president to continue.]
1:17 PM

Mwalimu Daudi said...
And what about a self-appointed minority elite? Are we allowed to resist them? Supposed the 60 million who voted for Bush decided that your 50 million should stand trial for "crimes against humanity" or some other such nonsense. Dan, do you not see what a can of worms you have opened when you falsely accuse Bush of war crimes and then make yourselves judge, trial, and jury to boot? What happens if you end up on the short end of the stick one day?False accusations are not just, and "people power" will never make it so.
1:34 PM

NYgirl said...
Who decides if the leader is an out-of-control dangerously criminal one?I am sorry Dan, but I do not agree that a huge majority makes it a civil revolution. A minority is a minority, & a subversion of the will of the majority is a dictatorship. I find it impossible to defend a dictatorship.
1:37 PM

NYgirl said...
Mwalimu, we seem to have crossed each other. You read my mind & wrote it much better than I ever could. Sure you don't have ESP :)
1:40 PM

Dan Trabue said...
If we had a history of listening to World Courts and abiding their decisions, that's one thing. We don't. And so the world is leary of trying to try the US. I'm saying there ought to be clear international laws, a strong international court and we ought to abide by them. As I'm sure you know (oh wait. Maybe you wouldn't know since it's hardly been covered in the liberal MSM), Bush and those in power have been opposed to joining the International Criminal Court. We've even passed legislation giving us the "right" to invade a country if the ICC were to arrest our soldiers!We're a superpower that's out of control.Tell me: Do you support the ICC? International law? Then why are you supporting this international scofflaw?
1:40 PM

Dan Trabue said...
NYgirl: so you would have been opposed to Germans opposed to Hitler trying to subvert the dominant paradigm (for argument's sake, let's say back before he dissolved the democracy)?
1:43 PM

Mwalimu Daudi said...
I know that the question was not directed at me, but I do not support the International Criminal Court, or any other self-declared World Court, nor international law (as it is presently understood). Where does the legal and moral authority for a World Court come from? Who decides what is international law, and how can they be held accountable? Why should such a system be imposed upon us against our will if we do not want it? Dan, when the European powers did the same thing in Africa, it was called colonialism and imperialism. What is so different now?And what kind of justice could we expect from a World Court composed of judges from such redoubts of democracy and freedom such as North Korea, China, Iran, and Zimbabwe?NY Girl: Love your web site!
8:36 PM

Dan Trabue said...
OK. So if there are no international laws, on what authority do we prosecute a Saddam Hussein? If you don't believe in international law, then world order is based purely on Might makes Right. Whichever countries the reigning superpower deems worthy of "saving" is the one that gets intervened upon.You're promoting a form of anarchy that doesn't make much sense to me.

Mwalimu Daudi said...
Dan, what we have is worse than anarchy! Anarchy would actually be an improvement over what we have now. At least with anarchy, someone might actually do something useful. With current international law, it is the criminals who run the show for their own own amusement.There was genocide in Rwanda and "international law" did nothing to help the Rwandan people. Saddam gassed the Kurds and thumbed his nose at one UN resolution after another, and the world turned its back. There is genocide in Sudan, and does international law come riding to the rescue? What about tyrants in Cuba, North Korea, Iran, and many other places who are crushing the life out of millions of people? Has international law done anything for the oppressed - beyond empowering their oppressors?By the way: Saddam is being prosecuted by the people of Iraq for what he did to them. Thank the Almighty that international law can't get its claws on this case!It is long overdue for the world to say "No!" to letting real criminals such as Libya and Zimbabwe run the UN Humans Rights Commission. A Coalition of Democracies - now that is moral international law!I think that you and I are the only ones left talking on this thread. I don't think we are going to convince each other of our respective positions, Dan.
9:55 AM

Dan Trabue said...
Sure we will. You and I just agreed that there should be a moral international law ("say "No!" to real criminals...") That's all I'm saying. We need international law AND we (the US) ought to lead the way by abiding by international law.
1:25 PM

NYgirl said...
Dan, what I belive Mwalimu & I are both saying is that international law, as it is today is not democratic. It gives an undue place to dictators & in the process legitamizes them.The UN & internation law, as they exist now, should not be followed by us as it is not legitamate. When there is a legitamate international law, certainly, we should abide by it.
4:47 PM

The Times Are A-Changin'

2005-08-02T11:14:00.000-07:00

Once upon a time, Bob Dylan sang:
Theres a battle outside
And it is ragin
Itll soon shake your windows
And rattle your walls
For the times they are a-changin.

Looks like he was right, though not in the way he wanted.
In a story on the lives and thinking of American 13-year-olds, Time magazine reports that sixty percent of the 500 surveyed by the magazine are against sex before marriage, and 63 percent believe they are too young to date at their age......only seven percent said their parents were too strict.And 63 percent consider their religious faith at least somewhat important in their lives.

Needless to say, the liberals are shocked about these results, after all, young people are supposed to be more liberal than their elders: conservative is old & liberal is progressive & revolutionary, right?

As with all other erroneous stereotypes, this one too is faltering in the face of much evidence that it is the liberals who are the moldy old establishment & conservatives who are the few & the brave, constantly ducking the attacks of the powers that be & rattling the cages of the old guard.

One of the most amusing kerfuffles is that of Cornell West claiming to be a radical determined to fight the establishment. How can the graduate of an Ivy League university & the professor of two Ivy League universities claim to be anti-establishment? The professor of an Ivy League school, especially one who has taught a Harvard, is the establishment. And as many studies show, a majority of university faculty are extremely liberal, a view that would hardly place him in a beleaguered minority. In fact,
By their own description, 72 percent of those teaching at American universities and colleges are liberal and 15 percent are conservative, says the study being published this week. The imbalance is almost as striking in partisan terms, with 50 percent of the faculty members surveyed identifying themselves as Democrats and 11 percent as Republicans.
The disparity is even more pronounced at the most elite schools, where, according to the study, 87 percent of faculty are liberal and 13 percent are conservative
Being told that recording a rap CD does not constitute scholarly activities is hardly academic persecution; it is merely a much needed reality check.

The leftist hegemony of our education system, which leads to harrasment & discrimination of conservative students & faculty, also leads to the suppression of free speech in favor of indoctrination. When asked to explain the disparity between the political views of the American population at large & the faculty members of Duke University, Robert Brandon, Chair of the philosophy department said:
“We try to hire the best, smartest people available . . . If, as John Stuart Mill said, stupid people are generally conservative, then there are lots of conservatives we will never hire.”
It is the arrogance of people like Dr. Brandon that has inspired the coalition to press for an Academic Bill of Rights, to forbid ideological discrimination & harassment.

The experiences of David French, during his job interview for the Cornell University, as well as the time he served in their admissions committee offer disturbing insight into the hypocrisy that pervades our institutions of higher learning.
During my second interview with the director of the program I was applying to join, she asked the following question: “I note from your CV that you seem to be involved in religious right issues. Do you think you can teach gay students?” [to which he replyed] How many gay applicants at Cornell have been asked: “Do you think you can teach Christian students?”
It seems that the liberal love of diversity does not extend to diversity of religion or ideology.
One of the most disturbing aspects of my experience at Cornell Law School was the year I spent on the school’s admissions committee. I saw a Christian student once almost get rejected despite tremendous academic qualification because members of the committee were wary of his “God-squadding” and “Bible-thumping.” He was admitted only after I raised strong objections to the committee’s obvious anti-religious prejudice.
Neither does the liberal love of affirmative action extend to those minorities who refuse the don the victim label & travel the road untaken.
I also saw some Latino and African-American candidates receive less affirmative action assistance because their perceived politics or career interests (such as an interest in finance) were deemed “less diverse” than other applicants with an obvious interest in “social justice.” Moreover, some applicants of color who indicated interest in the world of commerce were said not to have “taken ownership of their racial identity.”

How intolerant our teachers of tolerance are. Despite their best efforts to brainwash young people, many are rejecting the biased half-truths they are forced to recite. The example of the Columbia University students who stood up to the bulling of their professors is part of the growing trend. The fact that the NYT failed to cover the full story due to an inside deal with the university administration is indicative of the complicity of the MSM in the effort to keep not only young people, but the American public at large, ignorant of the ideological homogeneity of modern American universities & the persecution of those who dare to resist it. If there ever were a contest for "the gulag of our times", our elite universities would surely top the list.

The young people of today are not blind to the hypocrisy & stupidity of liberalism. It was conservatism that freed the women of Afghanistan & gave them the right to attend school, vote & run for office. It was conservatism that gave the people of Iraq the opportunity to vote for the first time in their lives. It was conservatism that the gave the people of Lebanon the courage to oust their oppressors. It will be conservatism, which despises despotism that will be the force of change, rather than liberalism, which fetishizes dictators & tolerates their outrages in the name of pacifism. It will be the values of the Greatest Generation that will serve to guide the new generation, which came of age to the sound of Muslim terrorists crashing planes into the TWC. They will serve as a "correction" to the whinny, losers of the hippy generation that squandered their inheritance.

The times are a-changin, ask not DNC, for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.

Dog Beats Man

2005-08-02T10:47:00.000-07:00

Jake is a 65-pound golden retriever and the only non-human in the tenth annual 1.2 mile swim from the infamous prison island to the San Francisco shore. The four-year-old pooch swam across the cold, choppy water in just under 42 minutes, finishing 72nd out of the more than 500 swimmers. Organizers say it was the first known crossing by a dog.

The crowd cheered as Jake made his way onto solid ground, shook himself and dodged a woman who tried to put a medal around his neck.

Jake’s owner, Jeff Pokonosky, says the two swim four miles a week and bodysurf together. His training secret? Jake always gets scrambled eggs before a big swim.

Yeah!

2005-08-01T17:41:00.000-07:00

As the Senate has been stalling on his nomination, President Bush has made the decisive move to have John Bolton appointed UN ambassador in recess capacity. Of course the usual suspects are howling.
Senator Harry Reid of Nevada, the Democratic leader, characterized Mr. Bush's move as "the latest abuse of power by the Bush White House". And pray tell Senator Reid, what are your thoughts about the abuse of power by the Democrats in the House & Senate?

But, as WC Varones mentions, there were no complaints from the Democrats
when President Clinton used a recess appointment to make James Hormel ambassador to Luxembourg... or when he used a recess appointment to put Roger Gregory on the 4th Circuit... or when he put Bill Lan Lee in as Assistant Attorney General over the objections of the Senate.

Now that there appears to be a glimmer of hope for overhauling the kleptocracy of despots that is the UN, perhaps we should contemplate the fate of the, soon-to-be-former ;) UN building with this list from The Man

Top 10 Uses For the UN Building

10. Additional nesting space for Pale Male's babes
9. Yet another Starbucks in the area
8. NYC's first Wal-mart Supercenter
7. Anything other than the UN
6. The new Iraqi embassy
5. World's largest bodega
4. More overpriced apartment studios
3. Headquarters for the 2016 Olympic bid committee
2. New York City's GOP Headquarters (probably only needs a few hundred square feet)

and the #1 use for the UN building
1. An East Side Football Stadium

Draining the Swamp

2005-07-29T15:28:00.000-07:00

President Musharraf of Pakistan takes one step towards the clean up of the Aegean Stables. Many terrorists, including the 7/7 four embarked on the road to death & destruction thanks to the indoctrination they received at Pakistani madrassas. While it may not act to halt Pakistani born terrorists, it will reduce the supply of total terrorists. However, as the elimination of foreign students cuts off a significant source of income for the madrassas, it may serve to reduce the number of Pakistani born terrorists also.

HAT TIP: NRO Corner

Save the Trees, Kill the Humans

2005-07-29T14:16:00.000-07:00

Could the Columbia tragedy have been caused by environmental regulations?

Considering how unprecedented the circumstances of the incident was, despite the long history of the space program, the possibility that the new eco-friendly measures lay at the root of the accident is hardly surprising. In many instances, environmental codes have resulted in products whose performance is far below that of the ones they replace. The low-flow toilets, which have forced many ordinary people to smuggle high flow models from Canada, is just one example.

Mike's Noise:

In 1997, NASA bent to pressure from environmental groups and began using a new type of foam on the main fuel tank.

Why all the fuss? Because the traditional foam insulation, the product that had been specified in the 1970 Shuttle designs, the product that was used up until 1997, was made by injecting polymer with chlorofluorocarbons -- "freon" -- compounds whose use was severely limited under the 1991 Montreal Protocol. With the adoption of this protocol by the U. S., the Environmental Protection Agency set target dates for major industries to phase out the use of freon.

After the new foam was used on Columbia mission STS-87 in November 1997, post-flight examination of the craft found that 308 of the special heat-absorbent ceramic tiles that cover the Shuttle's outer skin were damaged. The average number of damaged tiles for previous missions was 40. NASA engineers immediately suspected that the new insulating foam was breaking loose, but NASA supervisors were apparently more interested in impressive, successfully-completed missions than in adequate mission safety. The peeling foam was written off as a negligible risk.

As physicist Richard P. Feynman, a Noble laureate, said:
For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for nature cannot be fooled.

HAT TIP: SoxBlog, Kobayashi Maru

Update: I thought that the comments for this article were very interesting & am therefore posting them.

Regular Ron said...
Why does this not surprise me. Does this mean we can sue the shit out of the EPA, and the rest of the Environmental-nut-jobs for what happened to the Shuttle?RR
3:55 PM

Dan Trabue said...
Only if we environmental nut jobs can sue the gov't and others for damages done by unsustainable living.Let's see: How does one pay for the loss of 3,000,000-ish lives globally every year due to the personal auto and pollution? How does one pay for the fact that a huge number of streams in Kentucky are not safe to swim in? How does one pay for the damage done to the future by short-sighted policy now?
9:50 AM

docjim505 said...
You give some, you get some...How many people LIVE each year because the nasty ol' internal combustion engine used in ambulances and 'life flight' helicopters allow fast trips to the hospital?Does this mean that the government ought to take a laissez faire attitude when it comes to environmental protection? By no means. But there must be a decent (i.e. rational, logical, non-political) cost/benefits analysis applied. For example, IF the shuttle foam is breaking off and killing astronauts due to the manufacturing change, one ought to ask whether the lives of astronauts, the cost of the shuttle itself, and the 'lost benefits' of shuttle missions are worth a TINY bleed of CFCs into the atmosphere.
11:32 AM

Dan Trabue said...
Just a hunch, but I'd guess that fewer lives are saved by the internal combustion engine than are lost. And besides, I'm not saying NO cars. I'm saying we can't all drive. There are compromises.We could allow ambulances and fire engines, if we deem it wise. Further, we could allow small golf-cart sized electric cars for some folk who are not able to get around well due to health. But they don't need to travel above 25 mph. By doing these two measures, I'd guess we'd retain nearly all the benefits of cars with very very few of the negatives.I agree that there ought to be a decent cost/benefits analysis.One way of looking at it:What if there were no cars and it was announced that someone has invented one. The benefits are speed, comfort and convenience. The downsides are 4 million or so dead each year, millions more maimed, severe damage to the environment and trillions of $ in costs. Then it was put to a vote. Would you vote for it?
12:57 PM

NYgirl said...
Dan, how do you get at the 4 million dead a year number? Is that to car accidents?You should know that people die of horse related accidents too. Horse & buggy aren't cheap either.BTW, who's going to decide who gets to drive or not?
1:14 PM

Dan Trabue said...
1 million globally each year to car accidents. 3 million (going from memory, but I believe this is right) to air pollution which comes from many sources, not just autos.Yes people die from other sorts of accidents, but in these kinds of numbers? And when the activity in question is not a necessity? And when the person killed is not limited to the one involved (ie, innocent bystanders getting killed versus a speeder killing only himself)?As to who's going to decide who drives or not, flip that around: Who's going to decide that x number (hundreds of thousands, I'm sure) of asthmatics have to stay inside on smoggy days? That our streets aren't safe to bike on or walk across? It's not a matter of someone imposing their wishes on others. That's happening either way. There is definitely a conflict of rights here. I'd suggest it's a matter of which system is more just. In cases where you have a conflict of rights, I'd suggest the right to life and liberty outweigh the right of ease and speed.
1:46 PM

NYgirl said...
Liberty means the freedom to make our own choices & have them dictated to us by other people who claim to know what's best.If eveyone or 90% of us used horses, then the percentage of horse related accidents will rise sharply. What if the horse or his ridder tippes onto a pedestrian? Also, what if you don't have acess to a phone or your cell is broken or out of batteries & you ot somoone else is hurt. You won't be able to get them to the hospital, what about that?
2:20 PM

Kobayashi Maru said...
No responsible conservative is arguing for rampant pollution, even as some would love to continue bayoneting that strawman. What we're for is people having choices in how they live their lives - in case this wasn't utterly apparent by what we did in Iraq and Afghanistan while the UN dithered. That all the world's people may not make the same environmental choices as liberal elites in the first world are able to make due to our wealth does not make their opinions less worthy or give us a right to shove our choices down their throats. We may argue here about cars vs. not cars as an abstraction, but for billions around the world, the choice of getting their child to the doctor on time or being able to get a better job in the city is literally a matter of life and death. We have no moral standing to say, in effect, "wait while we debate space shuttles and hydrogen policy and we'll get back to you". Top down environmentalism (i.e., origin of the EPA) works to a point (i.e., big factories spewing from a pipe). Beyond that, it quickly grades into un-checked authoritarianism... which is where we conservatives get off the bus and back into our cars. :)
7:36 PM

Kobayashi Maru said...
P.S. thanks for the HT
7:38 PM

Dan Trabue said...
Kobayashi said:“That all the world's people may not make the same environmental choices as liberal elites in the first world are able to make due to our wealth does not make their opinions...”The poor, the sick, the elderly and the young are disproportionately harmed by unsustainable living practices, so don't you DARE try to make this about justice for the poor. Shame on you for trying!Having issued that rebuke, if you are indeed concerned about the poor then you should be commended. We ought to be. This for me is primarily a justice for the poor and dispossessed issue, as well as an environmental issue. It's just that many politicians (left, right, middle) tend to cynically wrap their corporate choices around the concept of “helping the poor and/or children” and I consider that blasphemous. Having said that, let me return to your comment (and I apologize for the length of the response, I'll try to quit after this):“What we're for is people having choices in how they live their lives...”That is exactly what I'm talking about as well, as I've already indicated. I'll speak specifically of my town (Louisville,KY) to address specific points:Someone is making the choice that it is okay to pollute our streams to the point that they're unsafe to wade in or fish from. Someone is making the choice that our air is unsafe to breathe (today in my town is an Ozone Action Day, meaning that asthmatics, the elderly, the young are to stay inside or risk their health due to the pollution of our air). Someone is making the choice that certain types of jobs are more important than the health of the poorer section of my town.Someone is making the choice that driving the way we do is worth the nearly a pedestrian a day who gets hit by cars (disproportionately children), worth the 80 or so people who get killed each year (higher than our murder rate), worth the thousands who are maimed, worth the millions that it costs our city.Someone is making the choice to use up resources that our children or grandchildren might also need.Choices ARE being made. And they're being made so that the costs are borne disproportionately by the poor, the sick, the elderly, the young, the unborn, and God's good creation.Choices ARE being made and liberties taken.All I'm saying is that we ought to revisit the choices we're already making and reconsider the costs. Reconsider if it's worth it.For what it's worth, I'm not for taking away all cars or anyone's precious “right” to drive (and I'm using the car as just one example of our unsustainable system). I'm advocating sensible use of technology in a way that doesn't unjust. I would assume we'd agree on that concept, yes?So, in order to do that I'd recommend:1.That residential speed limits be limited to 15-25mph. That's already the law most places. I'm just saying it should be enforced.2.That those who violate driving laws lose their license (driving's not a right, it's a privilege) for a time – 1 – 2 years first offense. It would take this sort of action to get people to respect speed limits and stop signs.3.That we create a system that encourages walking, biking, mass transit, wise proximity choices. We've already made the choice to create a system that encourages sprawl and cars, I'm just saying we change our priorities. You get the idea. This is not about limiting freedom any more or less than the current system is about limiting freedom. This IS about choices. Wise choices. Would you disagree? Look at it this way, if it were proven that by doing just the three steps listed above, we'd decrease the number of auto deaths and injuries by 50% and decrease the number of dangerously polluted days by 50% and the only costs would be the “liberty” to speed or run stop signs, the speed with which we get places, the “liberty” to live as far away as you want from where you work, worship and play... would you say those types of liberties are worth the lives impacted?Are we concerned about the poor and oppressed enough to change our ways or is the talk about concern for the poor just talk?
6:25 AM

NYgirl said...
Kobayashi, the hat tip was well deserved.Dan, your right, choices are being made. What makes you think that you are qualified to make those choices for me?Since you're so concerned about the deaths of innocents, how do you feel about all the innocent babies who are killed every year? 11:14 AM

Dan Trabue said...
I'm against killing innocent babies. You?
12:48 PM

Dan Trabue said...
What makes me think I'm qualified to make your choices? What makes you think you're qualified to make my choices? By driving the way we do, we are telling all the asthmatics to stay home or die. We've been through this already.I'm saying we, as a society, ought to improve our decision-making process and enforce and improve our laws correspondingly.An example: We don't allow people the liberty of purchasing hand grenades. Maybe some folk would like to fish with grenades, but we as a society have decided that that is a freedom that we can live without.Does it impinge on the liberties of the one who'd like to fish with grenades? Yes. We've made that decision anyway because the risks and negatives outweigh the positives.I'm saying the risks and the negatives that I've fairly exhaustively listed of our current lifestyle outweigh the positives. Do you disagree?Tell me honestly, if someone said told you that we can save 20,000 lives a year in the US by simply rigidly enforcing the 25mph speed limit, would you agree to it or not?
12:53 PM

NYgirl said...
Glad to hear you don't believe in abortion :)But Dan, what makes you think that speed limits aren't being enforced? I don't know about KY, but around here they are, just look at the number of speeding tickets people rack up.Asthma existed well before cars came into existance. As you say, we should as a society decide the choices & most people have decided that the positives of technonolgy outweight the negatives. Many polls show that the public is not in favor of enforced use of public transportation & curbs on the freedom of movement.Motor vehical accidents are sad, but they are the fault of the person driving the car & the careless pedestrians who fail to obey the rules of the road, not the car it self.
2:23 PM

Kobayashi Maru said...
Dan, in one fell swoop you've told me that I cannot stand up for the poor and elderly and sick and young of the world (i.e., the majority of it), because... what? Because I'm a conservative? Because it's up to you to defend the weak on your terms and with your top-down father-knows-best policy prescriptions? And it's automatically blasphemy if 'corporate' interests (oooh! baaaad!) align with those of the dispossessed of the world a lot more than Mother Jones likes to admit? With that kind of *intro*, it's clear that we ain't coming to any great new meeting of the minds on this thread, I'm afraid.Look through the labels. Look at the actions. I see non-corporate institutions like the UN *chartered* with doing good and *assumed* to have pure motives doing abominable things to tens of thousands of young girls in Congo and I'm supposed to worry about what? A factory in India that provides jobs that the folks there *welcome*, while polluting more than you or I might tolerate here in the U.S. because they're still trying to scrape and scramble and move up the income ladder like our great grandfathers were 100 years ago? Is it up to you and me to make those choices for them now that we've got ours? They won't necessarily make the same choices we made, but they also won't be the silly strawmen (hand grenades for fishing) that you propose... c'mon.The fact is, there's a tipping point in national average income where countries start to make much more responsible choices environmentally. There is no environmental perfection. The myth of it - the yearning for it, is what blinds many to real, honest trade-offs to be made. Nuf said. Nice post, NYG.Later.
7:02 PM

Dan Trabue said...
You didn't answer my question: Would you or would you not trade a strict adherence to a 25mph or less speed limit for 20,000 lives?And no, here in KY, in IN, in TN... the 25 mph speed limit is routinely disregarded. Is it different there in NY?As to the rest of what you and Kobayashi have said on this issue, it appears we just profoundly disagree.Kobayashi, I'm not condemning your conservative-ness. I'd love for conservatives to truly embrace their own ideals. Personal responsibility, for one. When you abandon personal responsibility for endorsing corporate ways and means, then I'm condemning your lack of conservative thinking.Don't react to that, think about it. Surely you agree? Any conservative who'd abdicate personal responsibility is giving up part of their conservative identity, no?Anyway, thanks for the conversation, y'all. All I ask is that you keep an open mind to reason and, if you've a bent towards mystery, to God and God's creation. Listen to the wisdom of the world and I will try as well.Peace.
5:56 AM

NYgirl said...
Dan, neither Kobayashi nor I are advocating the elimination of speed limits. Maybe every instance of speeding is not punished because the police cannot be everywhere all the time, but that does not mean that thet are noy being enforced in most places most of the time.It's good that you like to keep an open mind. As Kobayashi said, there is no objective standard for environmental perfection. Different people have different views of how much we should sacrifice in the name of environmentalism, & as we are a democracy, the majority view of the issue prevails.
1:10 PM

Bigfoot Did Not Walk By

2005-07-29T12:19:00.000-07:00

A hair sample was reportedly plucked from a bush near Teslin in the Yukon at a spot where several people claimed they saw and heard a large, hairy creature making a late-night run through their community. They also reported seeing an unusually large footprint......but, a DNA test has confirmed that it was not Bigfoot roaming the Yukon earlier this month — it was just a bison.

All of a sudden, the neo-con conspiracy theorists are starting to look sane.

Racism. Available in a Variety of Colors

2005-07-29T09:35:00.000-07:00

Looks like the Japanese are better than Americans at another thing: racism.
GAIJIN CRIME FEARS

A similar problem is the famous foreign crime wave. If you’ve read an
English newspaper in the past year, you’ve probably heard about the government
white papers and police studies that cite increases in foreign crime as one of
the biggest threats to public safety. The police are saying that the number of
crimes increased from 19,671 in 1993 to 34,746 in 2002, an increase of 76.6%.
While this sounds rather scary, critics have two very valid arguments about why
these statistics are extremely misleading.

The first is that people who have overstayed their visas are included in the figures.
Overstaying a visa makes up more than a quarter of all crimes committed by
foreigners and it is disingenuous to count this crime along offences with like
murder and theft. The second reason is that the official statistics do not
mention that while the foreign crime rate was 1.39%, foreigners made up 1.5% of
the population and were therefore statistically less likely to commit crimes
than Japanese people. If we look at the numbers in terms of crime rates (rather
than real numbers), crime by Japanese is increasing while crime by foreigners is
decreasing.

Why have the police chosen to concentrate on the relatively insignificant problems of gun control and foreign crime? One important reason is that there isn’t much they can do about the increases in crime committed by Japanese people. A long recession and high unemployment are invariably accompanied by rising crime rates, and until the economy recovers, crime is probably going to continue increasing.

Blaming foreigners for crime is also a good excuse for police officials embarrassed by
the decline in arrest rates. It’s just so easy to say something like, “We can’t
catch those wily foreign criminals because they use such exotic methods and it’s
so easy for them to just escape back to their home countries.” Crime was a major
issue in last year’s general election, and there were few politicians who
weren’t talking about it. Prime Minister Koizumi’s Liberal Democratic Party
promised to cut the number of serious crimes in half by 2008, while Naoto Kan’s
Democratic Party promised to hire 30,000 new police officers in the next five
years and raise the arrest rate for serious crimes to
84%.

Politicians like Shintaro Ishihara, the governor of Tokyo, use
people’s fears to get publicity, increase budgets for police and military
spending, and most of all to get votes. When Ishihara gave a speech saying that
the Self-Defense Force would have to be careful of rioting foreigners in the
case of a major earthquake, he was criticized by many critics, foreigner’s
rights groups and newspapers, but Tokyo voters ate it up. Foreign crime is
also being used as an excuse to limit immigration, and the government is
currently becoming much stricter in their policies regarding students from
overseas and in their dealings with those who have overstayed their visas. It’s
easy for the government to play on the fears of its citizens because people here
are really scared. The Koizumi administration has launched a campaign to double
the number of tourists visiting Japan by 2010, but in a public opinion survey
conducted last year, 32.4% of Japanese people don’t want more visitors to come
to Japan, mainly because they are worried about crime.

Even among native Japanese, there is a preference toward "white" complexions. Those of lighter hue are considered more beautiful that those of darker hue.
Say the word ‘Akita bijin’ (an Akita beauty) to a Japanese male and watch his eyes light up. The idea that women from Akita are beautiful dates back to at least the Heian period, and women from this prefecture are famous for their pale white skin. Akita’s women have an average skin whiteness index of 29.6%, making them far paler than the average Japanese women, whose whiteness index is only 26.6%.

Heaven forbid, Jesse Jackson were to move to Japan, he would probably demand preferential treatment to those with a skin whiteness index of 26.6% or less & quotas to limit the number of those with higher index ratings.

HAT TIP: NRO Corner

Arrogance! Prejudice! Yogurt!

2005-07-28T17:24:00.000-07:00

Is this the new rallying cry of France? In an effort to thwart PepsiCo's bid for the French company Danone, maker of the yogurt as well as Evian water, President of France, Jacques Chirac has asked ministers to come up with new proposals to "reinforce the protection of our strategic companies."

It's one thing to have a strategic interest in oil & gas pipelines, which run across a crucial region, but yogurt & a brand of bottled water, which IMHO doesn't have a prayer against Poland Springs. France is really scraping the bottom of the barrel these days.

I wonder what measures Mousier Chirac intends to take about this? The French hegemony over food & wine, not to mention fashion & art is long gone. Chest beating isn't going to bring it back.

Economist Eye For The Lonely Guy

2005-07-28T17:05:00.000-07:00

An economist doles out love advice: for a price.

Double Vision at The ACLU

2005-07-28T16:48:00.000-07:00

So, the ACLU thinks that Wicca is a legitimate religion. Fine, but one question:

Why aren't they suing about all the pictures of witches, witch hats & other paraphernalia that decorate any typical government building around Halloween?

HAT TIP: Stop the ACLU

Immunity From Accountability

2005-07-27T16:38:00.000-07:00

San Francisco International Airport is asking the government to shield it from potential lawsuits over failures at security checkpoints.

One of the reasons that private companies do a better job than federal agencies is due to the fact that they have a greater amount of liability, & thus more accountability. If this factor were to be taken out of the equation, is it not possible that they too will become as negligent as the government agencies?

How does offering immunity to private companies give the TSA any competition? It does nothing to raise the industry standards.

I can see how the enormous insurance premiums can be problematic. The way to address that is through legislation to limit the amounts paid for "pain & suffering" & having more stringent regulations against frivolous lawsuits. Immunity is not the answer.

A Ray of Light?

2005-07-27T14:54:00.000-07:00

The percentage of people holding a favorable impression of the United States increased in Indonesia (+23 points), Lebanon (+15), Pakistan (+2) and Jordan (+16). It also went up in such non-Muslim nations as France, Germany, Russia and India.

Support for suicide bombing has declined dramatically in all the Muslim countries surveyed except Jordan, with its large anti-Israeli Palestinian population. The number of those saying that "violence against civilian targets is sometimes or often justified" has dropped by big margins in Lebanon (-34 points) and Indonesia (-12) since 2002, and in the last year in Pakistan (-16) and Morocco (-27).

This has been accompanied by a cratering of support for Osama bin Laden everywhere except (unfortunately) Pakistan and Jordan. Since 2003, approval ratings for the world's No. 1 terrorist have slid in Indonesia (-23 points), Morocco (-23), Turkey (-8) and Lebanon (-12).

Muslim opinion also challenges jihadist orthodoxy that proclaims that giving power to the people, rather than to mullahs, is "un-Islamic." The latest Pew poll found "large and growing majorities in Morocco (83%), Lebanon (83%), Jordan (80%) and Indonesia (77%) — as well as pluralities in Turkey (48%) and Pakistan (43%) — [that] say democracy can work well and is not just for the West."

As, the article notes, the Pew Global Attitudes Project, who conducted this study, is not know for its love of America. Therefore, it isn't easy to argue that these numbers were cooked, making them even more convincing.

Could it be that the Iraqi insurgent's targeting civilians, as well as the bombings in Egypt & Lebanon are giving Muslims a wake up call? Could the sight of Iraqi's voting & the citizens of Lebanon banishing their thuggish occupiers have inspired other Islamic countries to yearn for democracy?

Worse :p could the Bushitler have been right?

Tunnels & Terrorists

2005-07-27T14:02:00.000-07:00

Two events which took place recently:

A drug smuggling tunnel, from Washington State to Canada, was discovered last week.

Ahmed Ressam, who was arrested, arriving from Canada into Washington, with a car full of explosives, was sentenced to 22 years. He was a member of the group known as the 'Millenium Bombers'. A shopkeeper from Montreal (French Canada), he acted as a facilitator for an Islamic militant cell known as the Armed Islamic Group, or GIA, for its initials in French. This group is affiliated with al-Qeada. Ressam is also a 'graduate' of bin Laden's terrorist training camps in Afghanistan. His co-conspirators, Samir Ait Mohamed and Abu Doha, have yet to be tried as they are awaiting extradition from Canada and Britain.

Girl Power in Iraq

2005-07-26T16:22:00.000-07:00

When Sondos' sister was murdered by insurgents for working with the Iraqi army, the 30-year-old exacted her revenge: She signed up for the military.

A very different type of woman than this one in Pennsylvania.

HAT TIP: Mudville Gazett, Michelle Malkin

The Battle of Britain

2005-07-26T16:01:00.000-07:00

[W]hy did Britain become the first country in the developed world to produce its own suicide bombers? Why is Britain just about the only country in the world to have produced suicide bombers who sought to kill not another people but their fellow citizens?

These are the questions this Spectator article attempts to answer. It cites the poor handling of British history in the country's schools, who fail to instill any sense of 'Britishness' in the students, as well as the leftist media. In it, I found a paragraph which puts forth one of the most compelling arguments against multiculturalism & liberal self-hatred heard recently.

But self-loathing in a nation, like self-loathing in an individual, is alienating. Someone who despises himself inspires greater contempt than affection, and a country that hates itself cannot expect its newcomers to want to belong.

The points made in this article should be a warning to us in America. If we too are to continue to acquiesce to the liberal demands of self-flagellation, we could end up asking our-selves the same questions.

The Ginsburg Precedent

2005-07-26T14:49:00.000-07:00

At her 1993 confirmation hearing, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, invoking her ethical obligation as a judge to maintain both the fact and the appearance of impartiality, steadfastly declined to answer any questions about her current views on issues that might come before the Court.

This was despite her having worked for the ACLU, and having fought to lower the age of consent to 12. Yet, the Senate, out of respect for the President of the United States & its citizens, voted to confirm her 96-3. Her refusal to answer pertinent questions did not lead to her being harassed by any Senators, including Orrin Hatch, a Republican. She was nominated on the 14 the of July 1993, & confirmed on the 3rd of August 1993.

Let us hope the Senate behaves in a similar fashion this time also. This is a golden opportunity for the Democrats to regain their credibility.

Here is a petition to Sen. Chuck Schumer reminding him of the Ginsburg precedent & asking that it be reciprocated. Sen Dick Durbin has urged Judge Roberts to answer all questions asked. He cited, what he felt was, Judge Robert's refusal to fully answer the questions of the Senate, as the reason for voting against the nomination of Judge Roberts to an Appeals Court position.

HAT TIP: Is It Just Me

NYT to Poor Women: Go Sell Your Selves

2005-07-25T15:19:00.000-07:00

Thanks to a 2003 Congressional mandate, organizations receiving USAID must declare that it ''does not promote, support or advocate the legalization or practice of prostitution.'' Predictably, the NYT is falling over it-self in its haste to criticize this policy.

A Brazilian based group, Womyn's Agenda for Change, headed by Rosanna Barbero, who became interested in working with the "sex industry" while studying in Cambodia. When there:
[w]hat she found was that peacekeepers and aid workers affiliated with the United Nations were fueling a sudden explosion in prostitution. Assessing the situation, she came to see sex work as an understandable, if far from ideal, response to poverty: ''If you have nothing, what do you do? You sell sex. That's what's left.''

And what about selling your children, particularly the female ones? What about infanticide? What about child marriage, or slavery or child labor? Some in this world believe that these are "an understandable, if far from ideal, response to poverty".

The article contends that some of the sex workers are there by choice. This contention is based on the story of a group of prostitutes, who were rescued by anti-prostitution organization, only to be abducted by an unidentified mob that broke into their safe house, who protested in front of the US Embassy claiming to not wanting to be rescued. The NYT author says that while [the] protest appeared to have been stage-managed by the hotel's owners,.... it illustrated how hard it is to determine whether sex workers are in brothels by choice or under duress.

Sadly, the series done by Nic Kristof is only available via paid archive, however, in that, he rescues two Cambodian prostitutes & follows them on their road to independence. It is clear that while poverty & sex discrimination are major hurdles for both girls, both struggle happily, to achieve a life of dignity.

Despite the contention that the 'prostitution option', is an answer to poverty, the unfortunate truth is that prostitution perpetuates poverty. People only seek work & start businesses when they have to: as without necessity, there will be no invention. When prostitution is an available option, families are more likely to pressure the less valued young women into seeking sex work to support their extended families, rather than to use more innovative means of earning income.

In many cases the daughters are sold or 'voluntarily seek' sex work to support not only their families, but also the drug addiction of their father & brothers. Prostitution acts as a temporary analgesic to poverty & addiction, making them less keenly felt on the short term, while failing to address their root causes & give impetus to entrepreneurial activity. As it removes the drive to rise above one’s station, it serves to keep its victims trapped in an intergenerational cycle of poverty. This is in addition to the fact that commodifing the most intimate of human contacts has terrible impact on culture.

While, working fourteen hours day sewing garments is hardly a life's ambition for many, I doubt that many would prefer prostitution.

Sony Will No Longer Pay For Play

2005-07-25T14:29:00.000-07:00

Sony BMG, which represents Jessica Simpson and Jennifer Lopez, among dozens of others, admitted to the misconduct in a statement. "Sony BMG acknowledges that various employees pursued some radio promotion practices on behalf of the company that were wrong and improper, and apologizes for such conduct," the company said. "SONY BMG looks forward to defining a new, higher standard in radio promotion."

This case certainly explains why "songs" & "artists" who have less talent than my toaster are get heavy rotation on radio. No doubt this was part of Mayor Bloomberg's ongoing war against noise. Getting SONY to cease bribing stations is music to my ears, but for this one jarring note:

"The settlement, which includes a $10 million payment to a fund for music education, is the first in a broad investigation by Eliot Spitzer, the New York attorney general, into incentives that record companies offer to radio stations in hopes of getting airtime that will raise their artists' profiles, increase a song's ranking and, of course, drive up sales."

Why is the New York attorney general stooping to Jesse Jackson like tactics. SONY was wrong to bribe stations, why are they not being punished for that crime? While, contributing to music education is wonderful, IMHO it is not appropriate to include such a thing as part of a criminal inquiry.

When big corporations are allowed to "make up" for their wrong doings by "paying off" the government, the government fails to punish them properly, & the corporations feel emboldened to engage in more wrong doing.

Girl Trouble

2005-07-24T14:11:00.000-07:00

The Democrats have long touted themselves as the party of women. However, in many instances, their mode of attack has been the humiliation & taunting of a woman based on her appearance, clothing choices & weight. This has been so, not only when the issue in question centers on a woman, but also when she is the wife of the person being attacked.

*Linda Trip was taunted for her weight & appearance. It affected her to the point were she underwent thousands of dollars worth of radical plastic surgery.
*Paula Jones was mocked for her appearance as well. She too underwent plastic surgery.
*Katherin Harris was labeled as "Cruella de Vil" for her make-up.
*Condeleeza Rice was painted as an "Aunt Jemima" and President Bush's "Brown Sugar" during her confirmation hearings. Notable liberals such as Garry Trudeau of Doonesbury & Ted Rall led the charge.
*Laura Bush was taunted, during the first term of her husband's administration for lack of fashion flair & sophistication.
*Teresa Heinz’s flamboyant style was considered a mark of her intelligence & independence. It was considered proof of her intellectual superiority to Laura Bush, despite the fact that Mrs. Bush obtained a bona fide Masters degree. Teresa Heinz's qualifications on the other hand, are more related to the wealth & connections of her own family & that of her first husband. The ten honorary doctorate degrees has received are thanks to the large amounts of money she has donated to various schools & causes. Her real degrees are a Bachelors degree in Romance Languages from South Africa & a diploma from the Interpreters School of the University of Geneva.

And now, in continuation of the proud tradition of woman bashing, the wife & young children of SCOTUS nominee Judge Roberts are being attacked for their clothing choices. The WaPo had an entire article dedicated to what Mrs. Roberts (a highly qualified lawyer her-self) & their children wore, during President Bush's press conference to announce his nomination of Judge Roberts.
His wife and children stood before the cameras, groomed and glossy in pastel hues -- like a trio of Easter eggs, a handful of Jelly Bellies, three little Necco wafers. There was tow-headed Jack -- having freed himself from the controlling grip of his mother -- enjoying a moment in the spotlight dressed in a seersucker suit with short pants and saddle shoes. His sister, Josie, was half-hidden behind her mother's skirt. Her blond pageboy glistened. And she was wearing a yellow dress with a crisp white collar, lace-trimmed anklets and black patent-leather Mary Janes.
The wife wore a strawberry-pink tweed suit with taupe pumps and pearls, which alone would not have been particularly remarkable, but alongside the nostalgic costuming of the children, the overall effect was of self-consciously crafted perfection.

Could it be that they simply wanted to look nice for perhaps the most important thing to happen to Mr. Roberts professionally? Hasn't Robin Givhan heard of a season called summer, a time when most people tend to wear lighter colors than during the colder winter & autumn months. While discussions of the political views of Mrs. Roberts maybe marginally relevant, I fail to see how her color preferences have anything to do with what kind of a Supreme Court Justice her husband would make.

There is also a tendency among those in the left to stereotype women as 'emotionally driven', peace loving & anti-war. The major feminist organization, such as NOW & Feminist Majority, always lobby against any defensive military actions taken by the United States government. One can imagine the shock of the DNC upon the discovery that, the Soccer Moms, who paved the way for both of Bill Clinton's victories, have become Security Moms, in the post 9/11 era. These women ensured the victory of George Bush over John Kerry. The astonished reaction to this shift is indicative of the poor understanding of the true nature of women.

A poll conducted in early 2002, showed that women considered increasing defense a greater priority than did men: 57 % versus 46 %. This was in contrast to a poll conducted the year before 9/11, which showed only 42 % of women considering defense a priority as opposed to 53% of men. These numbers bolster a study done of focus groups, in which, when told of how vulnerable we are to a missile attack, women were more insistant than men in calling to rectify the situation.

Until the Democrats shed their Victorian views of women, as docile, angelic, decorative fixtures, who should be lectured to, they will have a lot of trouble winning elections.

HAT TIP: Michelle Malkin, Mwalimu Daudi

Today's Abolitionists

2005-07-22T16:59:00.000-07:00

It is incumbent upon those who enjoy the privilege of freedom to aid those who lack it. As slavery continues to haunt the earth, iAbolish has taken up the charge to eradicate modern day slavery.

School Daze

2005-07-22T16:47:00.000-07:00

Contrary to popular opinion, a surprising degree of free speech flourishes on today’s campuses. Trouble is, it flourishes mostly among faculty, and then only when one is willing to toe the party line, which is drawn somewhere to the left of Che Guevara.

Please read the whole article. Steve Salerno speaks of the true state of academia today & how it harms students.

We're All Infidels Now

2005-07-22T16:01:00.000-07:00

Here is an article via Glenn Reynolds of the ethnic cleansing of Buddhists in the predominantly Muslim area of Southern Thailand.

This is the nation that tried "Peace Bombing" its way out of dealing with Islamofacists, linked to al Qaeda & Jemaah Islamiyah (responsible for the Bali bombings), by dropping origami paper cranes on terrorist plagued provinces at the urging of 'peace activists' in 2004. Despite the fanfare made of the peace bombing campaign, Thai police discovered a 22-pound bomb in a crowded road where many people were waiting to gather the paper birds.

Muslim separatists have been terrorizing these areas since the 1970's and 80's. This has escalated following the proliferation of Saudi funded schools, which advocate jihad & separatism.

If Only He Listened to Nancy Reagan

2005-07-21T15:28:00.000-07:00

NYT, via Chrenkoff

And on Saturday, during a funeral for children who died in the bombing on Wednesday, a unit of the Iraqi police stopped a suspicious-looking man approaching the funeral procession and discovered that he was wearing a suicide vest filled with explosives and ball bearings, the American command reported Sunday.
An explosives team disarmed the man, a Libyan, and no one was hurt, according to the American military.
"The bomber was high on drugs and is being treated for the potential overdose," said Col. Joseph DiSalvo, an American commander. The bomber, he said, "came here to kill the grieving parents of the children who were killed on Wednesday."

Girl Power!

2005-07-21T15:11:00.000-07:00

A tug-of-war, between the old & the new. Literally.

Britain Attacked - Again

2005-07-21T14:34:00.000-07:00

Four small blasts aimed at the London transit system have been reported. Two men have been arrested (H/T La Shawn Baber). So far, only one causality has been reported. Let us pray that it remains this way.

The NYPD will be conducting random checks of backpacks at subway stations, which is wonderful news. However, this part of the policy boggles my mind:

People who do not submit to a search will be allowed to leave, but will not be permitted into the subway station.

Does this mean that the NYPD considers it acceptable to bomb places other than subways? A Starbucks would be packed in the morning, as would Katz's Deli during lunch. I can't see why a terrorist who wants to kill infidels & create fear & panic would not bomb these places. They have yet to show a preference any particular type of structure.

I understand that people have privacy concerns & are pressed for time, but with the world being what it is, unless you are engaged in something illegal, I can't think of why a reasonable person would object to a uniformed officer searching their bag.

And, in order to keep a flurry of law suites from the ACLU at bay:
The police commissioner said officers would take pains to avoid singling people out for searches based on race or ethnicity.
"No racial profiling will be allowed," Mr. Kelly said. "It's against our policies. But it will be a systematized approach."

God forbid we should be hit again, like London was, we should sue the ACLU & AI, just as the victims of the 9/11 families are suing the Saudi government. Those who protect terrorists, & give them the means to harm us, are complicit in their crimes.

I hope the British people will not allow their country to become the next Israel. Now is the time to act. We stand with you.

Let The Mud Slinging Commence!

2005-07-21T12:59:00.000-07:00

The Kosmonauts have loaded their cannons & shooting all over the place hoping to hit something.

Here is a Daily Kos commenter speculating on the sexual orientation of the Judge Robert's son, Jack.

Did You Catch His Wife (1.42 / 7) When Roberts thanked his family, he mentioned his son, Jack...Roberts' wife's face fell. It was like a poker tell. I think we should research Jack. by mayan on Tue Jul 19th, 2005 at 13:13:01 PDT[ Parent ]

interesting observation (none / 0) wonder if anything will come of it... by storme on Tue Jul 19th, 2005 at 13:19:01 PDT[ Parent ]

He's probably gay (1.60 / 5) Of course, this is how ridiculous rumors get started, but extreme conservatives seem to have a lot of homosexual children... by Geotpf on Tue Jul 19th, 2005 at 13:19:08 PDT[ Parent ]

Worse - he's a lesbian n/t (3.00 / 3) "Figs! In the name of The Prophet, figs!" E.A. Poe by moltar on Tue Jul 19th, 2005 at 13:41:10 PDT[ Parent ]

A Trangendered One at that (none / 1) And an alcoholic and drug addict... That's how Karl starts the smearing process, isn't it??? I did not receive $ from Ketchum, U.S. Department of Ed or HHS to write this---though I wish I had. by Volvo Liberal on Tue Jul 19th, 2005 at 13:50:14 PDT[ Parent ]

Gannon!! (none / 0) "Quick, get me Gannon...Have I got a story for you, Guckert!" by mayan on Tue Jul 19th, 2005 at 14:26:02 PDT[ Parent ]

Here is a picture of the aforementioned Jack & the possible reason for the look on his mother's face :-)

Image: Gop & the City

Judge Roberts

2005-07-20T14:00:00.000-07:00

President Bush's SCOTUS nominee, to the surprise of everyone, was Judge John Robert Jr. Firstly; let me say that I was heartened to see that the President avoided Affirmative Action type politics, by nominating a woman just to please the Democrats. This would have done nothing but create a designated 'women's seat' in the Court & belittled every woman appointed to it.

Judge Roberts, who worked under Bush 41 as well as Pres. Reagan, is widely acknowledged as being a fine litigator with excellent interpersonal skills & temperment. He also argued strongly against Roe v Wade before the Supreme Court. However, a few of the clients he chose to represent do strike one as odd. Among them are:
Hawaii’s Democratic attorney general and governor arguing in favor of a race-conscious program to benefit native Hawaiians, and a Nevada regulatory agency seeking to limit property development around Lake Tahoe.

On the other had, he has proven himself to be immune from the temptation to abuse his position & legislate from the bench. One example being the case of the girl arrested for eating french fries at a Washington DC subway station. In his ruling that the incident did not violate the Fifth Amendment, he said:
"The district court described the policies that led to her arrest as 'foolish,' and indeed the policies were changed after those responsible endured the sort of publicity reserved for adults who make young girls cry...The question before us, however, is not whether these policies were a bad idea, but whether they violated the ... Constitution."

As he is more a Rehnquist, than a Thomas or Scalia, his nomination would not be as fraught with controversy as would that of a more conservative judge. I must confess that I was personally hoping for Judge Janice Brown. However, based on what I have read about him so far, Judge Roberts appears to be a fine pick.

Eric Rudolph: "I really prefer Nietzsche to the Bible"

2005-07-20T12:42:00.000-07:00

Recently, Eric Rudolph, who bombed an abortion clinic as well as Olympic Park, was sentenced to life in prison. I would urge you to read the wonderful piece written by Jim condemning his murders.

According to a majority of the MSM (NYT) he is a devout Christian & the motivation for his crimes were Biblical. However, a closer look at the words & writings of the man reveal a very different story, namely, that his preference for Nietzsche over the Bible is indicative of his being an atheist rather than a Christian. An adherent of Nietzsche, who said, "God is dead", is one who espouses nihilism & opposes Christianity.

Here is a passage written by Eric Rudolph to his mother:
“Most of them have, of course, an agenda; mostly born-again Christians looking to save my soul. I suppose the assumption is made that because I’m in here I must be a ’sinner’ in need of salvation, and they would be glad to sell me a ticket to heaven, hawking this salvation like peanuts at a ballgame….I do appreciate their charity, but I could really do without the condescension. They have been so nice I would hate to break it to them that I really prefer Nietzsche to the Bible.”

Why is it that whenever a Muslim suicide bomber strikes the media gives plenty of airtime to CAIR & Imams who call the act 'unIslamic' & assure us that 'Islam is a religion of peace'? But when an atheist, who was once affiliated with a Christian group, commits murder, there is very little space devoted to the fact that Rudolph was a member of the Christian Identity sect for only six months, because, in his own words, the father of a woman he was dating at the time was a member.

HAT TIP: La Shawn Barber

Were the 7/7 Four Not Suicide Bombers?

2005-07-19T18:48:00.000-07:00

I have been hearing this rumor for the past few days; the author does make some good points. There have been many incidents of suicide bombers in Iraq having their hands chained to the wheel of their vehicle or having their bombs detonated remotely.

EXCLUSIVE: WAS IT SUICIDE?
Why did they buy return train tickets to Luton?
Why did they buy pay & display tickets for cars?
Why were there no usual shouts of 'Allah Akhbar'?
Why were bombs in bags and not on their bodies?

The London bombers may have been duped into killing themselves so their secrets stayed hidden.
Police and MI5 are probing if the four men were told by their al-Qaeda controller they had time to escape after setting off timers. Instead, the devices exploded immediately.
A security source said: "If the bombers lived and were caught they'd probably have cracked. Would their masters have allowed that to happen? We think not."
The evidence is compelling: The terrorists bought return rail tickets, and pay and display car park tickets, before boarding _ a train at Luton for London. None of the men was heard to cry "Allah Akhbar!" - "God is great" - usually screamed by suicide bombers as they detonate their bomb.
Their devices were in large rucksacks which could be easily dumped instead of being strapped to their bodies. They carried wallets containing their driving licences, bank cards and other personal items. Suicide bombers normally strip themselves of identifying material.
Similar terror attacks against public transport in Madrid last year were carried out by recruits who had time to escape and planned to strike again.
Bomber Hasib Hussain detonated his device at the rear of the top deck of a No 30 bus, not in the middle of the bottom deck where most damage would be caused.
Additionally, two of the bombers had strong personal reasons for staying alive.
Jermaine Lindsay's partner Samantha Lewthwaite, 22, mother of his one-year-old son, is expecting her second baby within days. Mohammed Sidique Khan's wife Hasina, mum of a 14-month-old daughter, is also pregnant.
Our source disclosed: "The theory that they were not a suicide squad is gathering pace. They were the weakest link.
"We think it's possible they were told that when they pressed buttons to set off timers they'd have a short time to abandon the bombs and get away before the blast. Instead, the bombs exploded immediately."
Another intelligence source added: "Whoever is behind this didn't want to waste their best operatives on a suicide mission. Instead they used easily recruited low-grade men who may have believed they'd walk away."
At least 54 people were killed in the 7/7 blasts. Khan, 30, of Dewsbury, Shehzad Tanweer, 22, of Leeds, and Jamaican-born Lindsay, 19, of Aylesbury, Bucks, detonated devices on the Tube at Edgware Road, Aldgate and King's Cross.
Hussain, 18, of Leeds, blasted the bus at Tavistock Square. The Tube explosions went off almost simultaneously. But the bus went up an hour later.
Yesterday, Hussain's family told of their horror at the teenager's involvement in the massacre. They said in a statement: "We are devastated over the events of the past few days. Hasib was a loving and normal young man who gave us no concern and we are having difficulty taking this in.
"Our thoughts are with all the bereaved families. We have to live with the loss of our son in these difficult circumstances.
"We had no knowledge of his activities and, had we done, we would have done everything in our power to stop him. We urge anyone with information to cooperate fully with the authorities."
Police are urgently investigating the missing 81 minutes between Hussain arriving from Luton in London and the time his bomb went off.
His device may have malfunctioned. He may have lost his nerve. Or he may have panicked when he discovered the Northern Line, on which he is thought to have been due to travel, was suspended.
Officers want to discover if Hussain met anyone else who either strengthened his faltering resolve or reset his flawed bomb.

The Forgotten Chapter of Slavery

2005-07-19T16:12:00.000-07:00

It is estimated that possibly as many as 11 million Africans were transported across the Atlantic
-95% of which went to South and Central America, mainly to Portuguese, Spanish and French possessions
- 5% of the slaves went to the United States

At least 28 million Africans were enslaved in the Muslim Middle East

-the mortality rate for slaves being transported across the Atlantic was as high as 10%,

-the percentage of slaves dying in transit in the Trans Sahara and East African slave trade was between 80 and 90%

Ethiopia had slavery until 1942, Saudi Arabia until 1962, Peru until 1968, India until 1976 and Mauritania until 1980 & still continues in Sudan.

Please read this important article on the forgotten chapter of the slave trade & its continued presence in our world.

HAT TIP: Roger L. Simon

Even the Spam is Made in China!

2005-07-19T15:56:00.000-07:00

Here's something that ended up in my bulf folder recently recently :-)

Mr. Qin Wang
Lloyds TSB Pacific Limited
Hong Kong Branch
Fax: +852-301-6625908-07-2005
contact my email accountqinwang_hkinfo@o2.pl
QinWng6@netscape.net
qinwangqq@yahoo.com.hk

Thank you for giving me your time. Please be patient and read my email toyou.I am a staff of Lloyds TSB Group attached in Private Banking Services.

I am contacting you concerning a customer and, an investment placed underour banks management 3 years ago, I contacted you independently of ourinvestigation and no one is informed of this communication and I Wouldlike to intimate you with certain facts that I believe would be ofinterest to you.

In 2000, the subject matter; ref: bb/tsb/bank/73 came to our bank toengage in business discussions with our Private Banking ServicesDepartment. He informed us that he had a financial portfolio of 8.35million United States Dollars, which he wished to have us turn over on hisbehalf. I was the officer assigned to his case; I made numeroussuggestions in line with my duties as the de-facto chief operationsofficer of the Private Banking Services Department, especially given thevolume of funds he wished to put into our bank. We met on numerousoccasions prior to any investments being placed. I encouraged him toconsider various growth funds with prime ratings. The favored route in myadvice to customers is to start by assessing data on 600 traditionalstocks and bond managers and alternative investments. Based on my advice,we spun the money around various opportunities and made attractive marginsfor our first months of operation, the accrued profit and interest stoodat this point at over 10 million United States Dollars, this margin wasnot the full potential of the fund but he desired low risk guaranteedreturns on investments. In mid 2001, he asked that the money be liquidatedbecause he needed to make an urgent investment requiring cash payments inEurope. He directed that I liquidate the funds and had it deposited with afirm in Europe. I informed him that our bank would have to make specialarrangements to have this done and in order not to circumvent due process,the bank would have to make a 9.5 % deduction from the funds to cater forbanking and statutory charges. He complained about the charges but latercame around when I explained to him the complexities of the task he wasasking of us. Cash movement across borders has become especially strictsince the incidents of 9/11.

I contacted my affiliate in Europe and had the funds available in mainland Europe. I undertook all the processes and made sure I followed hisprecise instructions to the letter and had the funds deposited in asecurity consultancy firm, the firm is a specialist private firm thataccepts deposits from high net worth individuals and blue chipcorporations that handle valuable products or undertake transactions thatneed immediate access to cash. This small and highly private organizationis familiar especially to the highly placed and Well-connectedorganizations. In line with instructions, the money was deposited. He toldme he wanted the money there in anticipation of his arrival from Norwaylater that week. This was the last communication we had, this transpiredaround 20th June 2002. In June last year, we got a call from the securityfirm informing us of the inactivity of that particular portfolio. This wasan astounding position as far as I was concerned, given the fact that Imanaged the private banking sector I was the only one who knew about thedeposit, and I could not understand why he had not come forward to claimhis deposit.

I made futile efforts to locate him I immediately passed the task oflocating him to the internal investigations department of our bank. Fourdays later, information started to trickle in, that he was apparentlydead. A person who suited his description was declared dead of a heartattack in Cannes, South of France. We were soon enough able to identifythe body and cause of death was confirmed. The bank immediately launchedan investigation into possible surviving next of kin to alert about thesituation and also to come forward to claim his estate. If you arefamiliar with private banking affairs, those who patronize our servicesusually prefer anonymity, but also some levels of detachment fromconventional processes. In his bio-data form, he listed no next of kin.In the field of private banking, opening an account with us means no onewill know of its existence, accounts are rarely held under a namedepositors use numbers and codes to make the accounts anonymous. Thisbank also gives the choice to depositors of having their mail sent tothem or held at the bank itself, ensuring that there are no traces of theaccount and as I said, rarely do they nominate next of kin. Privatebanking clients apart from not nominating next of kin also usually inmost cases leave wills in our care, in this case; he died in testate.

What I wish to relate to you will smack of unethical practice but I wantyou to understand something. It is only an outsider to the banking worldwho finds the internal politics of the banking world aberrational. Theworld of private banking especially is fraught with huge rewards for thosewho occupy certain offices and oversee certain portfolios. You should havebegun by now to put together the general direction of what I propose.There is US$ 8,370,000.00 deposited, I alone have the deposit details andthey will release the deposit to no one unless I instruct them to do so. Ialone know of the existence of this deposit for as far as the financefirm, the transaction with our deceased customer concluded when I sent thefunds to the firm, all outstanding interactions in relation to the fileare just customer services and due process. The finance firm has no singleidea of what's the history or nature of the deposit. They are simplyawaiting instructions to release the deposit to any party that comesforward. This is the situation. This bank has spent great amounts of moneytrying to track this man's family; they have investigated for months andhave found no family. The investigation has come to an end.

My proposal,you share similar details to the late fellow I am prepared toplace you in a position to instruct the finance firm to release thedeposit to you as the closest surviving relation. Upon receipt of thedeposit, I am prepared to share the money with you in half and no more.That is: I will simply nominate you as the next of kin and have themrelease the deposit to you. We share the proceeds 50/50. I would have goneahead to ask the funds be released to me, but that would have drawn astraight line to me and my involvement in claiming the deposit. But on theother hand, you with a similar name as the original depositor would easilypass as the beneficiary with the rights to claim. I assure you that Icould have the deposit released to you in a few days. I will simply informour bank of the final closing of the file relating to the customer. I willthen officially communicate with the finance company and instruct them torelease the deposit to you. With these two things: all is done.

The alternative would be for us to have the firm direct the funds toanother bank with you as accountholder. This way there will be no need foryou to think of receiving the money from the firm. We can fine-tune thisbased on our interactions. I am aware of the consequences of thisproposal. I ask that if you find no interest in this project that youshould discard this mail. I ask that you do not be vindictive ordestructive. If my offer is of no appeal to you, delete this message andforget I ever contacted you. Do not destroy my career because you do notapprove of my proposal. You may not know this but people like myself whohave made tidy sums out of comparable situations run the whole privatebanking sector. I am not a criminal and what I do, I do not find againstgood conscience, this may be hard for you to understand, but the dynamicsof my industry dictates that I make this move. Such opportunities onlycome ones' way once in a lifetime. I cannot let this chance pass me by

I hope you understand because for once I found myself in total control andface to face with my destiny. These chances won't pass me by. I ask thatyou do not destroy my chance, if you will not work with me let me know andlet me move on with my life but do not destroy me. I am a family man andthis is an opportunity to provide them with new opportunities. There is areward for this project and it is a task well worth undertaking. I haveevaluated the risks and the only risk I have here is from you refusing towork with me and alerting my bank. I am the only one who knows of thissituation, good fortune has blessed you with a name that has planted youinto the center of relevance in my life. Let's share the blessing.

If you give me positive signals, I will initiate this process towards aconclusion. I wish to inform you that should you contact me via officialchannels; I will deny knowing you and about this project. I repeat, I donot want you contacting me through my official phone lines nor do I wantyou contacting me through my official email account. Contact me onlythrough this email address (qinwang_hkinfo@o2.pl )

I do not want any direct link between you and me. My official lines arenot secure lines as they are periodically monitored to assess our level ofcustomer care in line with our Total Quality Management Policy.Please observe this instruction religiously.

Please, again, note I am afamily man; I happily married with two kids. I send you this mail notwithout a measure of fear as to what the consequences might be, but I knowwithin me that nothing ventured is nothing gained and that success andriches never come easy or on a platter of gold. This is the one truth Ihave learned from my private banking clients. Do not betray my confidence.

If we can be of one accord, we should plan a meeting, soon.I await your response.
Sincerely,
Qin Wang
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